Judith Sheindlin, best known as “Judge Judy” on TV, will will deliver words of wisdom to graduates at Rye Country Day School’s 2023 Upper School Graduation Ceremony. Sheindlin is a RCDS grandparent of a 2018 and 2023 graduate.
Judge Judy Sheindlin is the presiding judge on Judy Justice, the Emmy Award-winning courtroom program from Amazon Freevee. She is also the creator and executive producer of Tribunal Justice, which premieres in June on Freevee.
In September 2021, Judge Sheindlin wrapped a historic 25 year-run of the Emmy Award-winning Judge Judy, one of the most successful programs in the history of television. Judge Judy finished as the #1 program in first-run syndication for 12 consecutive seasons and was #1 in daytime from 1998-99 season until it concluded in 2021.
Over the past two decades, Judge Sheindlin has won numerous accolades and awards from the legal, academic, and media worlds, and she has sponsored worthy philanthropic initiatives.
The rise of Judge Judy Sheindlin is an only-in-America story that began in 1982 when Sheindlin, then a prosecutor in New York City’s Family Court, was appointed to the Family Court bench by Mayor Edward I. Koch. She became Supervising Judge of the Manhattan court in 1986 and heard more than 20,000 cases. During her years on the bench, she earned a reputation for tough, no-nonsense jurisprudence, and established an “open court policy,” which let the public and media view the family court process.
She was honored for her groundbreaking work with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, situated next to one of her idols, actor Sidney Poitier. She’s also received the Gracie Allen Tribute Award from American Women in Radio and Television for her contributions to the broadcasting industry, and the Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award named after the late broadcasting pioneer. In 2012, Judge Sheindlin was inducted into the prestigious Broadcasting & Cable Hall of Fame, for her contributions to the TV business, and in 2019 was honored with an Emmy Award for Lifetime Achievement from The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.
She is the author of seven books including best sellers, “Don’t Pee on My Leg and Tell Me It’s Raining” and “Beauty Fades, Dumb is Forever.”
Voted one of the “100 Most-Trusted People in America,” Judge Sheindlin has been profiled on “CBS Sunday Morning,” “Nightline,” “A&E’s Biography” and MSNBC’s “Headliners and Legends.” She has appeared on “Saturday Night Live” and has been a guest on television programs including “Today,” “Good Morning America,” “Dateline NBC,” “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” “The Tonight Show,” “The Late Show,” “The View,” “Ellen” and “Entertainment Tonight.”
Judge Sheindlin, who was profiled in a New York Times front-page story, “Others Fade, but Judge Judy is Forever,” has also been the subject of major features chronicling her quarter-century run in Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, USA Today and New York Times Sunday Magazine. Other stories on the Judge have been published in Forbes, Family Circle, People, Time, Entertainment Weekly, Parade, Good Housekeeping, TV Guide and Redbook. She has also been interviewed for the “Archives of American Television,” which offered an in-depth look at her career and life as a mother, wife and grandmother. Judge Sheindlin has been featured as one of the top celebrities in entertainment, in Forbes’ “Celebrity 100” list multiple times and VH1 named her one of the “200 Greatest Pop Culture Icons.”
Here is a commencement address she delivered to New York Law School graduates in 2022.
