Meryl Streep is narrating a pair of children’s classics, “The Velveteen Rabbit” and “The Night Before Christmas,” that will be released later this year as audiobooks at Starbucks coffeehouses. “This is continuing our commitment to providing customers with compelling family entertainment titles,” Starbucks Entertainment President Ken Lombard told The Associated Press on Tuesday. The audiobooks feature musical accompaniment by George Winston, the Edwin Hawkins Singers and others. After an initial four-month run at Starbucks, Random House Inc.’s Listening Library will give the recordings a general release. Starbucks Corp. has been expanding its entertainment offerings over the past few years, releasing CDs by Ray Charles and the Rolling Stones, among others, and promoting the movie “Akeelah and the Bee.” The company recently announced an alliance with the William Morris Agency, a talent and literary agency that will help Starbucks identify music, film and book projects to consider for marketing and distribution in its stores.

The Public Theater’s 2006 Summer Gala will bring the Public’s 50th Anniversary Season to a close by honoring Kevin Kline and Meryl Streep, two prominent actors who have made significant artistic contributions to The Public Theater over the last four decades. The Gala will take place on Wednesday, June 28th at the Delacorte on the opening night of Macbeth, the first production this summer of Shakespeare in the Park. Artistic director Oskar Eustis said “Kevin Kline and Meryl Streep are the greatest stage actors of their generation and are indelibly linked to the history of The Public Theater. In honoring them we celebrate their achievements of the past and welcome them back to a central role in The Public Theater’s future.” The full article can be read here.

The May 2006 issue of “W” Magazine will feature the stars of the upcoming “A Prairie Home Companion”, Meryl Streep and Lindsay Lohan, on its cover. The magazine is also going to feature an insightful article on their film, their relationship to each other and their upcoming projects.

Streep blew into Brookline yesterday to accept the third annual Coolidge Award, handed out by the independent nonprofit Coolidge Corner Theatre to honor original and challenging filmmaking. “This award is really celebrating not so much me as what a small art theater, independent (means), and that creature has to be preserved,” she said yesterday. “I think it’s a really important thing and I’m proud to help out. Some of my really good friends are associated with the theater and I’m happy to support that.” Here’s an article on Meryl’s Coolidge Appearance.

Lindsay Lohan, Meryl Streep, Woody Harrelson, John C. Reilly and Lily Tomlin will all sing on the soundtrack to the movie “A Prairie Home Companion.” The album from the Robert Altman film will come out May 23 on New Line Records, Billboard.com reported. The album will also include original songs written and performed by “Prairie Home Companion” host Garrison Keillor and his Shoe Band, Billboard said. New Line is releasing a 25-track CD along with a deluxe edition that includes a DVD of music outtakes from the film based on Keillor’s radio show. The film is scheduled to hit U.S. theaters June 6.

James Earl Jones, Meryl Streep, and Coutrney B. Vance are among the stars who will participate in the seventh annual Dramatists Guild Fund Benefit on Monday, April 10 at the Hudson Theatre. Public tickets to the entertainment portion of the event, which begins at 9pm, are now being made available to the public. There will also be a salute to the late Wendy Wasserstein by Streep and her daughter, actress Mamie Gummer, and a scene from August Wilson’s Fences performed by Jones and Vance, who starred in the show on Broadway.

The San Francisco Film Society, presenter of the San Francisco International Film Festival (April 20-May 4) features Robert’s Altman latest movie, “A Prairie Home Companion”, for the Closing Night of the Festival, on May 4, at 7.00pm, at the Castro Theater. Tickets for the general public are $25 and will be available on April 4—Tickets for San Francisco Film Society members are $20 and will go on sale on March 28. For more ticket information please visit http://www.sffs.org.

Meryl Streep, fresh from the Oscars, hosted a benefit on March 7 at Bridge & Tunnel for her charity, Equality Now. The charity, is an international human rights organization dedicated to action for the civil, political, economic and social rights of girls and women. Visit http://www.equalitynow.org/ for more information on their work.

Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep, who play sisters in Robert Altman’s upcoming comedy “A Prairie Home Companion”, have taken the stage at the 78th Academy Awards to present their director with his Lifetime Achievement Oscar. Both actresses did a masterly, breathless impression of a film by special honoree Robert Altman, replete with overlapping dialogue, half-finished thoughts and constant interruptions, a double virtuoso performance.

Two-time Academy Award®-winning actress Meryl Streep will be a presenter at the 78th Academy Awards ceremony, telecast producer Gil Cates announced today. The Oscars will be broadcast live on March 5, 2006. Meryl’s last appearance at the Oscars was in 2003.