There probably isn’t a single nominee at tonight’s GOLDEN GLOBES AWARDS who could name 5 of the foreign journalists (and that term is used loosely) who vote for the prizes, but nevertheless the show has become one of the key precursors–certainly the most glamorous–to the Oscars. On the TV side, the Gloves have shown a welcome willingness to recognize shows and talent before the TV Academy is ready to take notice. Tonight’s telecast is hosted by Jimmy Fallon, who aside from being home network NBC’s signature talent, also seems as though his entire career has been pushing him to this exact moment. We’ll be providing live commentary throughout, so stay tuned.
8:05PM: Let the LA LA LAND celebration begin, with a, well, Fallon-sque all-star riff on the movie’s celebrated opening number. (The only downside to an all-star cast is that they’re not all going to be around for a one-shot extravaganza.)
8:10PM: Fallon is as smooth and inoffensive as always, his closest approach to snark being a Trump=Joffrey line.
8:12PM: And we begin with a SHOCK: Aaron Taylor-Johnson beats Mahershala Ali for Supporting Actor! This may literally be the first award Ali has lost during this awards season, and while he’s still the big favorite for the Oscar, this certainly puts Taylor-Johnson into the race.
8:13PM: Is it too soon for #GoldenGlobesSoWhite?
8:14PM: Switching to TV, Billy Bob Thornton beats Rami Malek, among others, with a Drama Actor win for Goliath.
8:20PM: Jimmy Fallon thought that Mariah Carey joke as so important that he stepped in even though Hugh Grant’s arrival had already been announced.
8:22PM: What a coincidence that Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant have shown up just after NBC ran a commercial for their new Netflix show!
8:23PM: BLACK-ISH’s Tracey Ellis Ross gains a big win, defeating Julia Louis-Dreyfus and the CW royalty for Comedy Actress.
8:26PM: This is what makes the Globes worthwhile: a Best TV Comedy award to ATLANTA, a show many TV Academy members probably haven’t even watched.
8:27: OK, fine, #GoldenGlobesNotSoWhite
8:33PM: At least we’re getting the Golden Globe Guy part of the evening over with early.
8:35PM: VInce Vaughn, relieved to be in a success after helping to kill TRUE DETECTIVE, plays his HACKSAW RIDGE intro very straight.
8:36PM: Welcome to 2017, where Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon are presenting to promote their latest… TV series.
8:37PM: 2016 was a largely horrible year, but at least it was the one that finally made Sarah Paulson a star.
8:38PM: PEOPLE VS OJ completes its victory lap.
8:48PM: Hugh Laurie aptly expresses the shock most felt to see him beat Sterling K. Brown and John Lithgow among others. His HFPA/Trump joke may have been too cerebral for this crowd.
8:50PM; Is Sofia Vergara mangling English still a functional joke?
8:52PM: LA LA LAND scores its first win of the night for Best Score.
8:55PM: Make it 2, with Best Song for “City of Stars”. (Not the movie’s best song, but apparently its official one.)
8:57PM: Does Ryan Murphy get a royalty from Kathy Bates’ AMERICAN HORROR STORY-inspired Turbotax ads?
9PM: The NBC/DC superhero workplace comedy POWERLESS is either going to be terrific or a huge miss.
9:03PM: Viola Davis gets to rehearse her Oscar acceptance speech at the Globes.
9:08PM: Davis killed, as usual. If Michelle Williams had 2 more scenes in Manchester there might have been some competition, but as it is the Oscar is almost inevitable.
9:09PM: Cuba Gooding Jr seems to be amusing himself quite a bit.
9:10PM: So… the Hollywood Foreign Press really enjoyed THE NIGHT MANAGER. Which is no slight against Olivia Colman, an acting treasure. (Catch her in FLEABAG too.)
9:12PM: How many years has it been since Goldie Hawn was on the Globes?
9:13PM: Goldie Hawn is doing Sofia Vergara’s discarded jokes.
9:14PM: You just know that during that pause after the word “Ryan…” Ryan Reynolds was halfway to his feet.
9:15PM: Ryan Gosling isn’t going to win the Oscar, so this is probably his biggest moment of awards season. He’s making the most of it.
9:22PM: LA LA LAND beat MANCHESTER BY THE SEA for Screenplay, which means LA LA might pull a clean sweep of its 7 nominations.
9:23PM: Somewhere Miles Teller is weeping.
9:27PM: Because of the Academy animation arm’s distaste for CG, ZOOTOPIA may be the only popular film to actually get a nomination. Luckily, it’s the best.
9:29PM: In a way it’s odd to salute Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, and not all the other entertainment legends who died in 2016. But they were such Hollywood royalty (and their deaths so recent) that it feels more earned than random.
9:37PM: ELLE can’t win the Oscar because it didn’t make the committee-chosen shortlist. So its win here doesn’t keep TONI ERDMANN from being the Oscar favorite.
9:40PM: Tom Hiddleston is yet another NIGHT MANAGER winner. There would actually have been some suspense in the Miniseries category if it hadn’t already gone to PEOPLE VS OJ.
9:42PM: The producers don’t dare play Hiddleston off while he tells his South Sudan story.
9:48PM: Is there a connection between Jake Gyllenhaal and Deadpool?
9:50PM: THE CROWN is prestige TV at its most prestigious, plus it’s international, but it’s Netflix, so Claire Foy’s win is no surprise.
9:52PM: And moments later, THE CROWN takes the big award for Drama. It’s an awards bait show, but nevertheless an excellent one.
9:54PM; For a second there, it sounded like they weren’t just playing CROWN director Stephen Daldry off, they were actually throwing something at him.
9:55PM: Next up is the DeMille lifetime award to Meryl Streep, which should fulfill anyone’s quotient of quality.
10:02PM: Viola Davis’s intro to the Streep award is unusually personal for this kind of thing.
10:05PM: The Streep montage=4 decades of cinema history. Talk about a lifetime of achievement.
10:09PM: OK, Streep probably should have been paying attention when Hugh Laurie told the same Hollywood Foreign Press joke.
10:15PM: And this was the part when the Golden Globes Lifetime Achievement award became the most trenchant political speech of the moment.
10:17PM: Are Streep 2020 t-shirts already on sale?
10:22PM: Unless there’s a shocking upset in its final 2 categories, LA LA LAND is going to set a new Golden Globes record with 7 awards.
10:25PM: It was already a big night for ATLANTA, and Donald Glover has a Best Actor award now too. Not a bad year for the new Lando.
10:32PM: Emma Stone’s moment, also known as another loss for Annette Bening.
10:35PM: Sing Street was probably nominated because (a) always tough to fill out the Comedy/Musical category, and (b) Harvey Weinstein, but it’s a marvelous film worth seeking out.
10:45PM: Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne try to look amused by Jimmy Fallon.
10:46PM: The major Movie Drama awards are being held for the end, but there’s no question about the night’s big winner: LA LA LAND, which pulled a clean sweep of its 7 awards and set a new Globes record. Anyone still think the lack of a SAG Ensemble nomination rules it out for the Oscar?
10:50PM: MANCHESTER BY THE SEA fans take a big sigh of relief as Casey Affleck takes Best Drama Actor.
10:53PM: You can tell how much Affleck hates this whole awards routine, but he pulled it off.
10:57PM: Not exactly a shock, but Isabelle Huppert’s win for ELLE as Drama Actress gives a bit boost to her Oscar chances, and it’s a big blow to Natalie Portman (and longer shot Amy Adams).
111PM: They didn’t just play Huppert off, they all but shoved her off the stage. For Sylvester Stallone and Carl Weathers. Not classy, HFPA.
11:02PM: The night started with a shock and ended with one, as MOONLIGHT swoops in to take Best Drama from MANCHESTER BY THE SEA. It’s the film’s only win of the night.
And that’s it! Takeaways: LA LA LAND is the film to beat at the Oscars, MOONLIGHT is still in the running, MANCHESTER BY THE SEA has probably been marginalized to the Actor and Screenplay categories, and Isabelle Huppert is really in the Actress race. The night’s biggest WTF moment was its first, as Aaron Taylor-Johnson incomprehensibly won Best Supporting Actor.
On the TV side, ATLANTA and THE CROWN had big nights, and the HFPA really enjoyed THE NIGHT MANAGER.
And it wasn’t a particularly great night for Jimmy Fallon, whose only highlight was the LA LA LAND opening number.
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