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Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong placed his finger to his lips, indicating that, for the moment, this must be kept under wraps, but promised that he and Jeffrey Katzenberg are in talks, and will announce their news soon. Anticipate a step forward for the entertainment industry.

We were at KCET’s tenth Visionaries Award dinner honoring Patrick and wife Michele B. Chan at the Beverly Wilshire, where $500,000 was raised for PBS’s primary station in Southern California. KCET’s call letters stand for Community Educational Television, with more than $9 million raised from previous Visionaries galas that honored civic leaders from varied fields. Among them: L.A. Live’s Bernadette and Tim Leiwicke, Tina and Rick Caruso, Nancy Daly and Richard Riordan, Stephen Bollenbach, Kelly and Robert Day, Eli Broad, Marion and John Anderson, Diane and Bob Malone, Kathryn and Steven Sample.

Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong was born in South Africa in 1952 to immigrant parents, his father being a village doctor practicing alternative medicine in China. After graduating from high school at age 16, Dr. Patrick went on to receive his medical degree at age 23 and interned at Johannesburg’s General Hospital. He earned a Master of Science degree from the University of British Columbia, becoming the first resident honored with multiple research awards simultaneously, before relocating to the University of California for his surgical training in Los Angeles.

Now a world-renowned physician, surgeon, inventor, scientist, professor, entrepreneur and philanthropist, Dr. Patrick pioneered the anti-cancer drug Abraxane in 2005 with its galvanizing success for metastatic breast cancer and diabetes. It is also being developed for the treatment of lung, melanoma, pancreatic, prostate, and other hard to treat cancers.

He remains in the forefront of adult stem cell development, with KCET directors informing, “As founder and chairman of the global pharmaceutical company, Abraxis BioScience, Dr. Soon-Shiong pursues a commitment to treating the patient, not the disease, through discoveries based on an individual’s genetic code, as well as advocating healthcare reform that incentivizes physicians to keep patients healthy.”

The Los Angeles Business Journal estimates Dr. Patrick’s net worth at $7.1 billion. He and wife Michele, a former film and television actress, have two children and are diehard surfers. Michele is building playgrounds in the Boyle Heights area, and she and Dr. Patrick support shelters and soup kitchens where their children are volunteers in downtown L.A. Dr. Patrick is committed to re-opening Martin Luther King Hospital with a $100 million guaranty. Additionally, he’s asked Warren Buffett and Bill Gates for their help.

Dr. Patrick, a board member of Saint John’s Health Center, and Michele contributed $100 million in two separate gifts for the creation of the Chan Soon-Shiong Center for Life Sciences at Saint John’s that, he envisions, “will establish Saint John’s as the community hospital of the future.”

With his brilliant grasp of medicine, he believes the best solution is for individual care, and is not in agreement with the Obama Health Reform bill.

Medical associates anticipate that, in time, he will receive the Nobel Prize. In truth, Dr. Patrick’s inspirational story is destined for the history books. In a video tribute, Dr. Robert Mendez acknowledged Dr. Patrick’s pioneering genius, “I’ve always wanted to take x-rays of his brain … are there two brains or three?” Introducing Dr. Patrick and Michele were filmmakers Jerry Zucker and wife Janet, who had the dinner guests howling with laughter.

“A very special evening, this is the first time I found the AFI Life Achievement Award dinner as glamorous as the Oscars. This year’s honoree, Mike Nichols, represents theater, film, television, and loyal colleagues came from everywhere to pay homage, as Dustin Hoffman claimed, to ‘a great artist down to his toes.’ I’ve been to many of these Life Achievement Awards, and this rates A-plus.” So reports our keen observer Lynne Segall, former v-p of entertainment and luxury advertising for the Los Angeles Times.

She reminded that last year’s honoree Michael Douglas was among the dinner guests, who, after glancing at the distinguished crowd, joked, “Where the hell were all of you last year?”

Mike Nichols was honored with AFI’s 38th annual Life Achievement Award on a soundstage at Sony Studios (formerly MGM), where Judy Garland and her Tin Man, the Cowardly Lion and Scarecrow pals filmed The Wizard of Oz in 1939. (A prequel, Oz, the Great and Powerful, is being produced by Disney with Sam Raimi directing, and with buzz attaching Robert Downey, Jr. as the Wizard.)

AFI’s first honoree was director John Ford in 1973, Lillian Gish, at age 90, was honored in 1984 (the only silent screen actress to receive the award). The youngest recipients were Tom Hanks in 2002 at age 45, Steven Spielberg at age 48 in 1995, Jack Nicholson at age 56 in 1994, Orson Welles at 59 in l975.

Honorees have included Elizabeth Taylor, Bette Davis, Barbara Stanwyck, Barbra Streisand, Meryl Streep, Billy Wilder, Warren Beatty, Sidney Poitier, Al Pacino, George Lucas, Kirk Douglas, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Robert De Niro, John Huston. The only non-Americans to receive the award were Sean Connery, Alfred Hitchcock, and David Lean.

Turning out for Mike were the likes of ABC’s Anne Sweeney, Sony’s Howard Stringer and Amy Pascal, Disney’s Rich Ross. Diane Sawyer, his wife of 22 years, accompanied Mike, who was toasted by numerous cast members that included Meryl Streep, Cher, Candice Bergen, Harrison Ford, Julia Roberts, Emma Thompson, Robin Williams, who chided Mike with, “Isn’t it rumored that you had final cut on your circumcision?”, Dustin Hoffman, Mary-Louise Parker, Natalie Portman, Elaine May, with whom he appeared in their riotous An Evening with Mike Nichols and Elaine May during the ’50s. Not many know that Mike and his family fled Berlin and Nazi Germany in 1939.

Nor do many know, as Elaine revealed, that Mike is related to Albert Einstein, a cousin on his mother’s side, according to Professor Henry Louis Gates’ research at Harvard University. Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel dueted on their infamous Mrs. Robinson, from The Graduate, the 1967 classic directed by Mike, whose credits reach back to Broadway in 1963 and his breakthrough direction of Neil Simon’s Barefoot in the Park starring Robert Redford and Elizabeth Ashley, a hit that ran for 1,530 performances.

More Broadway followed, as did any number of films that included Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Television beckoned with HBO’s award-winning Angels in America, and Mike’s among those few artists receiving Oscar, Tony, Emmy and Grammy awards.

Presenting the award, Meryl Streep explained, that “When you’re directed by Mike, he makes you believe you are the only person in the world, and that makes you believe in yourself.”

Responding to the praises and humor of the evening from his industry colleagues, Mike sighed. “Now, if I thanked everyone who contributed to my life over the years, we’d be here until Miley Cyrus receives her AFI Life Achievement Award.”