The Golden Globes are one of the oldest and most prestigious award ceremonies in the entertainment industry. According to their history on their official site, “The first awards presentation for distinguished achievements in the film industry granted by Hollywood Foreign Correspondents Association – the precursor of today’s Hollywood Foreign Press Association – took place in early 1944 with an informal ceremony at 20th Century Fox.”
The Golden Globes has awards for both movies and television, as opposed to the Academy Awards, aka the Oscars, and the Emmy Awards, two separate awards ceremonies for movies and television, respectively. There are 27 categories in the Golden Globes: 15 for motion pictures, and 12 for television. The nominees for this year were announced on Feb. 3, which, according to an article written for IndieWire, was later than usual due to the pandemic.
Awards for Best Picture, Actor and Actress in Motion Pictures are further split into two categories, Drama and Musical/Comedy. The nominees for the Best Drama Picture this year are “The Father,” “Mank, Nomadland,” “Promising Young Woman” and “The Trial of the Chicago 7.”
The nominees for Best Musical/Comedy Picture are “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, “Hamilton,”” “Music,” “Palm Springs” and “The Prom.”
Some were surprised at the nomination for “Hamilton,” which was released on Disney+ over the summer, because as written in an article for The New Yorker, “It is not cinema. [It] is a well-shot theatrical production featuring performances captured nearly five years ago.”
The Golden Globes can often set a precedent for the Academy Awards, as the same article pointed out that last year, the ceremony “accurately predicted most of the eventual Oscar winners.” If Hamilton is also nominated for and wins an Academy Award, it would provide writer Lin-Manuel Miranda the Oscar he needs to become an EGOT winner, individuals who have won an Emmy, Golden Globe, Oscar, and Tony Award.
Another unusual nomination is for Chadwick Boseman for Best Actor in a Motion Picture. Boseman, who sadly died in August, starred in Netflix’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” which was released in November of 2020. While Boseman will not be the first to win a posthumous Golden Globe, he will be in very small, but excellent company, including, according to an article written for People, Heath Ledger, who portrayed the Joker in The Dark Night, and Howard Ashman, the lyricist behind some of Disney’s most iconic songs.
The third Best Picture category is for Best Animated Picture. This year’s nominees include “The Croods: A New Age,” “Onward,” Over the Moon, “Soul,” and “Wolfwalkers”. Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios, both owned by the Walt Disney Company, have had a steady record of wins in this category throughout the last decade, interrupted only four times. The competition to knock Disney from their pedestal is always steep.
A difference to this year’s nominees comes in the Best Director of a Motion Picture category. Last year, every nominee was male, despite the fact that there were several movies released that year with female directors. The same trend followed for the Oscars, prompting some to speak out.
According to an article written for Insider, actress Natalie Portman had her Dior cape embroidered with the names of the snubbed directors for the red carpet of the Academy Awards. Movies may have been scant in 2020, but evidently, not even a pandemic will prevent the Hollywood Foreign Press Association from passing judgement. The 78th Golden Globes will take place virtually on Feb. 28, hosted by comedians Tina Fey and Amy Poehler.
