Much About Last Night's Golden Globes Stank. But The Awards That Were Given Were (Mostly) Just Fine

 

Last January the Golden Globes was trying everything in its power to recover from the scandals that had rocked it over the past two years. There had been comments about racism and bad behavior from members of the Hollywood Foreign Press for years. Brendan Fraser had gone out of his way to accuse a prominent member of sexual abuse. And it had not helped that despite NBC or any network refusing to cover it in 2022, the show had gone on anyway.

In 2023, the HFPA had gone through the motions of reform, much of which Hollywood did not believe. When the awards took place many prominent nominees – including Fraser – did not attend. The Globes was trying everything in its power to put on a happy face and pretend their problems were fine.

In the first ten minutes of the show, host Jerrod Carmichael made it very clear to both the attendees and the viewers at home that he had no intention of letting anybody off the hook.

I’ve been watching awards show for decades and comedians for longer. I’ve seen funnier performances than Carmichael’s stint last year and more brutal take downs of truth to power. But I’ve never seen in his  opening monologue a more ruthless showing of tearing down the pretention to a more deserving subject. I won’t attempt to do justice to Carmichael’s performance (I strongly urge you to seek it out on YouTube) but it was certainly the bravest and most daring comedy I’ve seen at an awards show in my lifetime. It could stand as a model for both liberals and conservatives as to how to attack Hollywood; liberals in a way to speak truth to the establishment; conservatives by doing so without punching down. I’m not saying that Carmichael’s hosting was the nail in the coffin that took the HFPA down (the fact that so many prominent winners were absent had to be a factor) but I’m damn certain it didn’t help.

I didn’t expect Jo Koi, the emcee of last night’s Golden Globes, the first under the new leadership, to be at that level of brilliance but I thought he might at least be able to maintain the standard of the many superb emcees who have hosted in the past decade: the power duo of Amy Poehler and Tina Fey, Seth Meyers’ dry acerbic wit in 2018 and the brilliant stylings of Jimmy Fallon in 2017, whose awards had the most brilliant opening number in Golden Globe history. (YouTube that too.)  But while there were many entertaining moments in last night’s show, none of them were due to Koi. I’ll be honest, I’d never heard of him before he was announced to host the show in December. Based on what I saw last night, I would prefer he had stayed an unknown.

I’ve rarely been more grateful for the fact that the emcee of the Golden Globes has less to do than at other awards shows. Every moment Koi was on stage, you could feel the oxygen being sucked out of the room. There was not a single joke that he told last night that landed and I really wondered if Koi had gotten the job because no one else had wanted it. For much of the 1990s until 2007, the Golden Globes had no host. Koi’s presence was one of the better arguments for going back to that format.

I’d like to say that was the low point of the night, were it not for the inaugural award for Best Stand Up Comedy Special. The nominees were five of the greatest comedians in history – and Ricky Gervais.

I often wonder if Gervais has some kind of leverage over the Golden Globes that the general public is not aware of; it’s the only explanation I can think of as to why he not only has hosted five times, each time never being entertaining and giving less of a damn about being there, but why so many of his show – none of which I find the least entertaining – have not only received nominations but so many awards. I suspect I will be savaged by those who call me a philistine for not appreciated The Office or Extras or any of the other shows he’s done, but I have never laughed a single time at any joke he has ever told.  I get cringe comedy, when done well – but in my opinion Gervais only has the first part of it right, never the second.

And it can’t have escaped my notice that Gervais was the only white, cis male in the category and he still won – as well as his absence from the proceedings. Maybe there was some kind of clandestine deal between the new guard and Gervais – “we’ll give you the award but don’t show up to accept it.” That he was absent is the one grace I give the new Globes.

Now that I have buried the Globes, let me praise them.

I have little problem with the awards that were given in the television category last night. How could I; I predicted that many of them would take place? That Succession dominated the Drama category came as a shock to no one, certainly not anybody who saw the final season. I’ll confess it was enjoyable seeing so many actors who had played such miserable human beings for four seasons actually being self-effacing as they took their awards. Matthew MacFayden, accepting for Best Supporting Actor,  said he was amazed at the love for ‘human grease-stain Tom Wambagnass” and after that joke landed, followed up with “human grease-stain CEO”  reminding us that he had ‘won’ Succession. Kieran Culkin’s acceptance speech for Best Actor was equally wonderful: he took the stage with the kind of utter incapability and messiness we’ve come to expect of Roman over four seasons, and he was just as sure every step of the way he’d screwed up. Sarah Snook did take a second prize for her work is Shiv, and I was glad to hear the speech she didn’t get to give when she won two years ago.

The Bear’s dominance for comedy was not much less of a surprise. White took his second straight Best Actor prize and was just as cool and collected as the year before. Ayo Edebiri, who won for Best Actress, was not and I truly enjoyed her deer in the headlights speech in which she first thanked her family at The Bear and then remembered to thank her actual family. The first award is always the trickiest; I’m assuming you’ll get calmer in the months (and years to come)

 That both the Bear and Succession managed sweeps was not surprising. Nor, frankly, was the similar sweep of Beef. Ali Wong was calm and collected, despite the fact that there was clearly a lot of love for her. Steven Yeun was funnier, saying first that he did not expect his awards speech to be the message from Frozen and then thanking his daughter for watching Frozen. It is likely, if not a certainty, that Beef will be doing the same for awards show for the next week.

The one TV award that stood alone was, for the record, one that I predicted correctly: Elizabeth Debicki won Best Supporting Actress for The Crown. Debicki’s speech was, not surprisingly, keeping with her portrayal of Diana: restrained, calm and grateful. She probably won’t win the Emmy next Monday, but she’s almost certainly the odds on favorite for next year.

Many of the presenters in television were superb in a way that Koi just couldn’t manage. Personal highlights were Ray Romano and Keri Russel. Romano started by saying we should tell the truth and he lavished praise for her work on The Americans. Russell thanked him and then said he loved “Everything he did.” Romano considered this, began to present and then naturally came back to it. Russell admitted she hadn’t seen any of his work. Romano then said they just go back to lying to each other and said: “he’d almost finished ‘The Laundromat’. Russell then reminded him her series was The Diplomat.

Other highlights in TV showed Issa Rae talking about the differences in limited series, in which every major one had to do with alcoholics, Elizabeth Banks gushes over British accents and saying she wanted to her Helen Mirren and Bella Ramsey say ‘vitamin’ and a personal favorite as Gabriel Macht and Patrick J. Adams presented the award for Best Drama in which they commented: “It must be nice to have your show finally receive appreciation after so long.” (As we all know, Suits has been surging in Netflix over the past year.) Gina Torres and Sarah Rafferty came out to present the award with them, which was nice.

And while I don’t normally speculate on the film side of the Globes, it’s worth noting there were more than a few awards that made be very happy as an admirer of film and television.

Emma Stone was one of the performers who lost to Snook for her work in Showtime’s The Curse. (I have yet to see the entire series, but having watched quite a bit of it, I have little doubt Stone will be among the contenders for a Best Actress Emmy next year.) She couldn’t have minded because she took her second Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy for her superb performance in Poor Things. Stone is a heavy favorite for her second Academy Award this spring and she has been someone I have been in crazy, stupid love with since…Easy A. Both of those performers have made her one of my favorite actresses and she’s proven over the last decade she’s one of the most versatile.

Robert Downey Jr. deserved took the Best Supporting Actor prize for his incredible work in Oppenheimer as Lewis Strauss. Downey has won three Golden Globes, the first for his work in Ally McBeal back in 2001, a performance which showed a major shift in his comeback from a youth spend mainly on drugs and alcohol. Downey, as in previous two acceptance speeches, was typically self-effacing. He mentioned as how many people had commented on the subtlety of his work and then point out: “That’s not a compliment.”   A nomination is practically inevitable for Best Supporting Actor; I badly want to him win.

Those of you who wondered why Cillian Murphy never received an Emmy nomination for his work on Peaky Blinders will have to settle for his ‘consolation prize’ of Best Actor in a Drama for Oppenheimer. Murphy, as fans of his work are well aware, is the most constant force in Christopher Nolan’s work going all the way back to Batman Begins. He paid tribute to him and mocked him gently.

Murphy is the heavy favorite for Best Actor, but his greatest opposition will come from his counterpart in Best Actor in a Comedy/Musical, Paul Giamatti who won for The Holdovers. Giamatti gave a wonderful speech, saying that all the standing and sitting down had been hell on his knees – “I’m never gonna be set for John Wick 5’  he said to great laughter – paid tribute to ‘Alexander the Great’ – Alexander Payne, the brilliant writing and directing force who has been causing the Golden Globes all kind of agita since at least About Schmidt. (Curiously, he received no nomination from the Globes, but he has three trophies from them already.)  Giamatti has never gotten his due for Billions and likely never will, so as someone who has loved him since at least American Splendor he deserves an Oscar frankly more than Murphy. (And as someone who was a huge admirer of his father A. Bartlett Giamatti, former Commissioner of Baseball, I’d like to see him win for that reason too.)

Oppenheimer’s domination of the Golden Globes should not come as a complete shock, but considering the level of the competition I still didn’t expect it to win five prizes. I thought it possible that Barbie, which had dominated the Musical/Comedy nominations as much as Oppenheimer the dramas would do as well. But in truth most of the kinds of awards it would win are not the type the Golden Globes ever gave – costumes, cinematography,  editing. I’m privately impressed that the Globes actually honored Poor Things over it for Best Comedy or Musical – I was certain Barbie would take it. That said, I can’t fault any of the other choices; least of which Christopher Nolan finally getting to accept a Best Director prize, which in my opinion he has been owed since Memento.

On a personal note I am glad for Oppenheimer’s recognition because, unlike so many previous award winners, it is also one of the biggest box office successes of the year. Nolan deserves the Oscar not just for making an extraordinary film but for taking what has to be the biggest risk in Hollywood in decades. For more than two years, there was speculation that Oppenheimer might be the very last big budget ‘serious’ studio film Hollywood ever greenlit. And there’s no way that this movie should have managed to not only become a critical hit but a box-office smash. Even Robert Downey Jr, seemed bemused by this in his acceptance speech: “A three hour movie about the making of the atomic bomb grosses a billion dollars: does that track?” A similar mention was made when it took Best Picture about Oppenheimer being a three hour serious talking film” both of which it was. And for all the discussion about ‘Barbenheimer’ for the first half of 2023, I could see Barbie being a smash; Oppenheimer was far harder to believe.

And yet that is how it played out. There is no other filmmaker working today who could have made such an incredible gamble, convinced the studio to go along with it, released in the middle of summer blockbuster season, and have it pay out for everybody involved. Steven Spielberg could have once, but despite the immense quality of both West Side Story and The Fabelmans, he no longer has the gift to bring box office gold for his serious pictures. Christopher Nolan gambled all the goodwill twenty years of box office and critical hits have gotten him on Oppenheimer. And not only did it work for him, he might just have given enough room for future filmmakers to reopen  the summer for ‘quality movies’ in a way that they just haven’t been since Saving Private Ryan a quarter of a century ago.

And that rising tide might well carry other boats. For all the terrible reviews the show received (much of them justifiably for Koi) the ratings were the highest in four years, fifty percent higher than last year. I have a feeling many of those viewers were less interested in seeing if Succession took the Best Drama prize then to see how ‘Barbenheimer’ did at the Golden Globes. This will definitely have an affect on other awards show, including the Academy Awards.  If this happens both Nolan and Greta Gerwig (another film maker I adore) will have taught Hollywood that if they nominate movies people watch, some of which are huge risks, that awards show will be watched too. Counterintuitive I know but as we learned the past year studio executives have never been that bright to begin with.

Well, stay tuned. Tomorrow I will be back with the results of the HCA TV awards which will have a lot more different winners than last night’s Golden Globes and probably make me much happier with the results. (By the way, YouTube. Look for ASTRA. You won’t be disappointed.)