The 77th Golden Globe Awards premiered Sunday, January 5th on NBC. The Golden Globes award the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s (HFPA’s) picks for the best performances in movies and television for the past year. Celebrities showcased beautiful outfits and touching speeches. Host, Ricky Gervais, included a raunchy monologue to begin the show and plenty of political commentary was made throughout the evening. Both Ellen DeGeneres and Tom Hanks were honored with lifetime achievement awards during the event as well.
The clear winner of the night was the cast of Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood, taking home three awards. The film won ‘Best Motion Picture in a Musical or Comedy,’ ‘Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role,’ and ‘Best Screenplay.’ Brad Pitt took home the award for his supporting role as Cliff Booth, while director Quentin Tarantino took home the best screenplay award. Another notable win was by the cast of 1917 in the ‘Best Motion Picture Drama’ category. However, fans could not react to this win as the film has not yet been released in theaters. Director of 1917, Sam Mendes, took home the ‘Best Director’ award as well.
This year’s Golden Globes made history in two categories. The award for ‘Best Original Score’ was given to a solo woman for the first time. Icelandic composer, Hildur Guðnadóttir, is only 37-years-old and has already made history for her work in Joker. Later in the evening, the award for ‘Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy’ was given to Awkwafina. Awkwafina won for her starring role as Billi in The Farewell. Both of these talented young women and their achievements brought more attention to a consistent issue with the Golden Globe awards: the lack of diversity.
For five years straight the Golden Globes have failed to nominate any women in the ‘Best Director’ category. Ava Durvernay won her well-deserved ‘Best Director’ award for Selma in 2015, and no women have been nominated since. Audiences have been calling this issue out for years and yet nothing has changed. In 2018, while presenting the ‘Best Director’ award, Natalie Portman infamously announced, “Here are the all male nominees.” Portman later said that calling these issues out is necessary in order to change the misrepresentation in Hollywood. Little Women, directed by Greta Gerwig, and Hustlers, directed by Lorene Scafaria were completely left out of the ‘Best Director’ category despite both films being critically acclaimed. The blatant sexism present with the members of the HFPA leave audiences unsatisfied with the Golden Globes more often than not. The HFPA needs to adapt in order to better represent the opinions of the public.
