In a year marked by the coronavirus pandemic, the show is set to continue – and the Golden Globe did just that on Sunday night, albeit virtually. Alexandra Canal, from Yahoo Finance, breaks down.
Video transcription
ADAM SHAPIRO: Welcome back to Yahoo Finance. It’s time for some fame and fortune with Ali Canal. Because last night, Ali, we had the Golden Globe. And, you know, it’s an honor to be named. But you have to tell me –
ALEXANDRA CANAL: This is yours?
ADAM SHAPIRO: – the giants of streaming positioned as avant-garde, towards the Oscars, what can you tell us?
ALEXANDRA CANAL: Oh my God. First of all, Adam, this is incredible. I did not know that. What a fun fact. But yes, the Golden Globe was last night, and it was a really big night for streamers, especially for Netflix. Netflix came out with 10 Golden Globe wins. They did very well when it came to “The Queen’s Gambit” as well as “The Crown”. “The Queen’s Gambit” won the Best Mini Series. This is a category that is normally dominated by HBO, but last night, we saw Netflix come out with that victory.
And then, for “The Crown”, which won the award for Best TV Series Drama. Other pertinent victories for Netflix include the late Chadwick Boseman for best actor for his role in the Netflix film “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”. His wife received the award in his name, and it was a very emotional moment on the show. We also saw Aaron Sorkin win the best script award for the critically acclaimed “The Trial of the Chicago Seven”.
So overall, a really great night for Netflix, but it wasn’t the only streamer to have its moment in the spotlight. We also had Hulu, Disney, Amazon Prime Video with very important victories. Amazon Prime really did very well with the new Borat sequel. This earned them the award for Best Comedy Film, making him the first streamer to win that award. Sacha Baron Cohen won the title of Best Actor for his role in the film. So Borat, who knows? It is a cult classic. And it was very good for Amazon Prime.
And then Apple TV Plus, which is usually a streamer who struggles with these streaming giants, but last night, we saw Jason Sudeikis go home with the Best Actor win for his role in “Ted Lasso”. I personally haven’t seen this one yet, but people praise it. They say it’s a really, really good show, so I’m going to have to take a look at it. So even Apple TV Plus goes away with its first Golden Globe.
But when it comes to the final night’s prize – the big one is for Best Drama Film – which went to a more traditional film distributor with “Nomadland”. This is from Searchlight Pictures. We also had Chloé Zhao as the Best Director. In fact, she is the first woman to win this award since 1984.
So, a very interesting night. It was a little bit, I don’t mean boring awards, but there weren’t many good times. I find it very difficult to do this in a virtual environment. There were some technical difficulties here and there. There was a little bit of embarrassment, especially when people were making their speeches and playing music. It’s like they don’t – they can’t get off the stage. They will end up sitting on the couch all the time.
So, I think we could see some of that weirdness happen when the Oscar airs on April 25th. They did not release much information about how it will be, but I think we can expect it to be very similar to the Golden Globe, a small mix of in person in certain locations, but most of it being virtual. So, we’ll see what happens when the Oscar comes on April 25th.
SEANA SMITH: Well, Ali, in the meantime, you have to take a look at “Ted Lasso” because I saw a few episodes, and it’s really, really good. It’s a cheerful, fun, short little show that you can tune in very quickly.
But first, on a more serious note, though, we talked about it last week, going to the awards night. There was a report in the “LA Times” talking about the lack of diversity in Hollywood. This is a problem, clearly not the first time. This is talking specifically about the Hollywoods Foreign Press Association. It was approached briefly on stage last night, but clearly, more needs to be done on this subject.
ALEXANDRA CANAL: Much more needs to be done. And you’re right, they approached it on stage. We had presenter Tina Fey and Amy Poehler mentioning this in their opening monologue. And right after that, we had three members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association taking the stage and basically saying, listen, we know that we have a lot more work to do here. We will start the changes immediately. But it was a very brief moment.
And that was it. We didn’t hear much after that. So, hopefully, this is the beginning of a big change in Hollywood. And this is not just something that is affecting the Golden Globe. This is a deeper issue in Hollywood and really deepens in the Hollywood ecosystem. Last year, we received Oscar adjusting eligibility requirements to promote more inclusion. On Friday, we had Netflix launching an unprecedented diversity report. They said they will pledge $ 100 million over the next five years to help bridge this diversity gap.
But the reality of the situation is that many of these notable Black centric programs have been completely excluded from Golden Globe nominations. This includes “Insecure”, “I May Destroy You”, while other flashy titles like “Emily in Paris” received this nomination. So, you know, even Tina Fey said that award shows, they are stupid. They don’t mean anything, right?
But they do provide windows of opportunity. They provide visibility. So now they are still important, and there is certainly a lot of work that Hollywood has to do to correct this injustice that permeates the entire industry and just be more culturally diverse.
ADAM SHAPIRO: OK, let’s get to gossip and dirt. Who was despised and what surprises were there?
ALEXANDRA CANAL: So, in terms of sketches, I was very interested – it was very interesting last night, because “Mank” was the most suitable film for Netflix with six nominations, and came out completely empty-handed. So I always find it funny. Like, why give this movie so many nominations if you’re not even going to give them a prize?
In the same vein, we also had “Promising young woman”. Now, this moment is a bit of a surprise when they received all this love for gold – for their own Golden Globe nominations. But, again, they also left empty-handed. Many people thought Carey Mulligan could win the Best Actress award, but it didn’t.
In terms of surprises, I think Andra Day for “The United States vs. Billie Holiday”, which yielded Hulu’s only victory. And Andra Day became the first black actress to win this award in 35 years. And she had a very close competition with Oscar winner Viola Davis. So, congratulations to her. She was amazing in that movie. She has an incredible voice. You should absolutely go and check this out.
And then another surprise was Rosamund Pike for winning the Best Actress award for the Netflix series, “I Care a Lot”. You could tell on her face that she just didn’t expect to win this award. And you saw that reflected, I think, in your acceptance speech as well. So these, for me, were some of the biggest criticisms and surprises. “Hamilton the Musical” from Disney, I think there was a lot of buzz and momentum to get into it, but they were also completely excluded from the Golden Globes.
But I think that at the end of the day here, a lot of critics were going to “Borat” instead of Disney’s “Hamilton the Musical”. And I always think that this category is interesting anyway, why are you going to follow the musical path or are you going to do the comedy path? They are very different genres for me, but clearly, last night, they followed the path of comedy.
ADAM SHAPIRO: Ali Canal with Fame and Fortune, the other big surprise is that these things are great entryways, if you need to.
ALEXANDRA CANAL: [INAUDIBLE]