Sunday, January 22, 2006

 

2006 Golden Globes Recap

I said, earlier, that I would write about the Golden Globes and now, here it is. The write-up, six days after everyone stopped caring.

At the beginning of this show, a heavily-modified version of The Pussycat Dolls “Don’t Cha” (funny, the Dolls say “Don’t Chu” more than “Don’t Cha”) serves as the song to get everyone pumped. It was a weak song when it played in its original form on the radio and on the Net, and the Globes version don’t improve on it. It’s pointless talking about an offshoot of a product produced by a product of a record-label, or some music executive’s imagination. Naturally, anything musical and demographic-enslaved conceived by a team of corporate bitches, is just waiting to suck.

Anyhoo, we get to Queen Latifa, who looks rather stunning. She feels obliged to comment on the fact that the Awards are taking place so soon after the official observance of MLK Jr. Day, which leads to the obligatory applause as it is politically correct to do after these types of comments are made. (Audience, I don’t wanna read e-mails about how racist and bigoted I am, because I am black and furthermore if I greeted another black male with the phrase “nigga”, he would greet me the same as well and there’d be no hard feelings; whereas if some of you did the same the outcome would be less desirable. So, nyah.*) After, QL does this embarrassingly inoffensive dance to suggest “hey, it’s time to party” and “let’s get this party started”, there is a slight pause and the pause is long enough for me to wonder, “did they get it? Do they feel pumped and excited now that Queen Latifa has done her cute little dance to get everyone in a festive mood? Did it work?” We’ll never know.

Adrien Brody and Natalie Portman present George Clooney with his statuette for Best Supporting Actor, Syriana. His acceptance speech is one of the few that got genuine laughs out of me. “I wanna thank Jack Abramoff”—chuckles, some nervous, others “I can’t believe he went there” type of chuckles—“you know, just because. First one up. [Just to] get this thing rolling.” Clooney chuckles himself. “I dunno why.” Earlier, Clooney says he hasn’t had his first drink yet, yet his mannerisms tell a different story. (It’s just me making these observations. I’m just trying to start shit up.) “Who would name their kid Jack with the last words ‘off’ (sic) at the end of—” and this is the dealbreaker for me. I start laughing. Only Clooney has the balls to openly mock a once trusted official who’s now getting pity looks from his peers and sympathy votes from some media outlets. Abramoff’s name just doesn’t serve as the “punch” for many “punchlines” these days. Clooney continues, amidst rolling laughter, “No wonder that guy screwed up. Uhh, heh, alright I just got bleeped. Uh, thank you all very much. . .” From here, I get a feeling everything goes downhill. It’s quite impossible to top an acceptance speech like Clooney’s. Well, not impossible. . .

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* If you yelled “hey, my nigga” to me on the street, I would give a friendly wave. Such labels I do not take personally anymore, not since the pilot for The Boondocks contained a record-breaking number of mentions of the word once thought to be the most inflammatory epithet in the English language. And besides, it’s very hard to offend me anyways, especially since I work so hard to offend others. It’s my life’s work.
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The same two presenters present Rachel Weisz with her statuette (Best Supporting Actress) for The Constant Gardener. She has a very modest and statesmanlike acceptance speech, which gets the job done. It’s funny—right after these two get off stage, we learn that one of the sponsors is “Hummer”. That’s right, the most gas-guzzling, fuel-inefficient vehicle on the market and one of the reasons why Syriana exists, is co-sponsoring the Globes telecast. What irony.

After the commercials, Jessica Alba and Luke Wilson present the Best Supporting Actor for TV movie/miniseries/show to Paul Newman for Empire Falls, who not surprisingly wasn’t there to get it. Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) and Teri Hatcher, a desperate housewife, present the Best Supporting Actress for TV movie/miniseries/show to a memorably hysterical Sandra Oh for Grey’s Anatomy. I can’t tell you how hot she looks, but anyway—she stumbles to the stage and gives another one of those quirky acceptance speeches. “I feel like someone’s set me on fire,” she starts after a lengthy battle with the letter I. After a Sally Field-type speech, she leaves, this time more in control of herself and there’s one more commercial break before we get to Drew Barrymore saluting one of the five Best Picture (Drama) nominees, Good Night, and Good Luck. (At this juncture, I shake my head and say to myself, “GNaGL probably won’t get a thing.”) Emmy Rossum walks out and introduces Philip Berk, the “hunk of the Hollywood Foreign Press” (her words). He’s the HFPA President. He gives the obligatory speech, and clears the stage for another desperate housewife, Nicollette Sheridan, who’s accompanied by Jesse L. Martin. Geena Davis is Best Actress (TV Series—Drama) for Commander-in-Chief. She does the best she can to shock her compatriots by saluting Donald Sutherland as “the God at whose alter I worship.” A few whoo-hoo sounds coming from the Peanut Gallery. Earlier, she gets laughs and applause for telling a completely fictional story, and another round of semi-claps for thanking her husband for coming to the set, and Rod Lurie gets a mention for creating this innovative series.

Rod Lurie just doesn’t get enough love. He almost lost his mind while he battled with the studio for control over The Last Castle, a film that did lukewarm business at the box office but was a critical darling. He then began his adventure in television with ABC, Line of Fire, a series which began strongly but then precipitously lost favor among audiences. His second go-round with the network, Commander-in-Chief, is rumored to be on either the auction block or the chopping block. Either way, the descriptor “short-lived series” is likely to be permanently associated with it. Previous box office efforts The Contender and Deterrence were once-again highly-praised but not widely seen. Again and again, Rod Lurie is described as being among the most talented screenwriters and directors in the Industry and yet, consistently gets the small end of the funnel. The lack of awards recognition for Lurie’s work only further substantiates the possibility that Rod Lurie is Hollywood’s most underappreciated artist.

Ian McShane (Deadwood) and Evangeline Lilly present the Best Actor Globe (TV Series—Drama) to Hugh Laurie, for House. It’s quick; he decides to randomly thank three people, all staff members of House, and says the rest can “lump it”, which gets a chuckle or four. Script Supervisor Ira Horwitz, hairstylist Diana Akrey (possibly wrong spelling), Laurie’s agent Christian O’ Dell (possibly misspelled) all are recipients of the random drawing, and then Laurie moves on to thank a few others (including his family—betcha didn’t see that one coming). It’s product-hawking time.

Hour 2. Melanie Griffith comes and talks up The Producers soon after she calls out her daughter to the stage. A humorous pairing is found with Matt Dillon and Queen Latifa. I feel sorry for Dillon. If Dillon was the character he played in Crash, Latifa would smack the fucking shit out of him, chew him up & then shit him out—metaphorically speaking, but probably literally as well. They hand over the Globe to Empire Falls for Best Made-for TV miniseries or movie. Next one. William Petersen and Pam Anderson show up. (I groan, “Here we go.”) For Best Actor (TV—Musical or Comedy), Steve Carell for NBC’s The Office. Evidently, Carell’s wife wrote his acceptance speech for him. It’s not that funny, but Carell gives it his best shot and hey, the audience laughs along, however canned the laughter seems to be.

Again, some commercials before we get to Tim Robbins, da’ man. He salutes another Best Picture (Drama) nominee, The Constant Gardener. Another thing I like about Robbins is that he‘s a fast talker, so it’s pretty much guaranteed that he’s not going to be spending long delivering his presentations. Jamie Foxx shows up. He says it’s such an “unpredictable night”. That’s actually a genius plug, even though it was groan-inducing. Not even Madonna got the opportunity to plug her albums at awards ceremonies. Well, maybe the Grammys, but every artist gets that opportunity in that venue.

He gives it to Reese Witherspoon for Walk the Line, a Best Actress (Musical/Comedy), her performance being neither too funny nor too dramatic, but all-around great. Of course, if she were eligible for consideration only in the Dramatic category, she wouldn’t have stood a chance of even being nominated. I know, that would not be fair. Her husband gave her a gleeful push to the stage; she gives a rather standard acceptance speech; time for Chris Rock. I grin like a guy getting ready to score with a chick at a party.

By now, Chris Rock’s comment “I want everybody to relax, you only have to be nice to black people for two more hours, okay?” has made the rounds with the media and on blogs and on talk shows. If anyone holding a notable position in the Industry is reading this, let me just say to you—if you invite Chris Rock to say anything at any event, chances are he’s going to say something that you’re going to have an issue with. His job is to get under somebody’s skin, while making them laugh at the same time. A job that Rock excels at.

Another one of my favorites for this ceremony comes when Chris says, “. . .Desperate Housewives is one of the biggest shows on the planet, and [referring to nominee Mary-Louise Parker] Weeds is only watched by Snoop Doggy Dogg!” And Mary-Louise Parker gets to use her Globe as a fancy doorstop.

A monstrous five-minute long commercial break follows, literally a torrent of commercials are hurled at you before you see Emma Thompson walk onto the stage to talk about Pride & Prejudice. Eric Bana and Kate Beckinsale gives the next elegantly-crafted golden skullbreaker to Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Best Actor (TV miniseries/movie) for his performance in CBS’s Elvis. He beat out Kenneth Branaugh as FDR, Donald Sutherland as an agent helping Mira Sorvino bust a Human Trafficking ring, Ed Harris in Empire Falls, and The Girl in the Café’s Bill Nighy. Any one of these actors was better and more believable than Meyers as Elvis. And, since this is my blog, I get to say things that other people might find unfair. I felt that Meyers did great just to get people to tune in to the first hour of Elvis. But no more than that.

But he gave a modest and humble acceptance speech. I know its standard, but this guy is known for being fairly cocky. Humility from these kinds of guys are not the norm.

The same Bana/Beckinsale duo give the Best Actress Globe, same category, to S. Epatha Merkerson for Lackawanna Blues. I have to admit, it felt pretty good to see her win. She’s one of the hardest working actresses in TV.

Another astonishingly-long break follows. After, Colin Firth explains to us what Match Point is all about and Harrison Ford with Virginia Madsen give Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana the award for their Brokeback Mountain screenplay adaptation.

Jill Hennessey gives the award for Best TV Series-Musical or Comedy to Desperate Housewives. And that’s about all I’m going to write about that.

Penelope Cruz reminds everyone that Mrs. Henderson Presents is actually among the nominees.

Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker read out loud Paradise Now. The volume of the clapping is surprisingly modest for such a win.

Hany Abu-Assad, the film’s Palestinian director, thanks the “Foreign Press (sic) for [their] recognition of the film, for the crew and cast. . .but also as a recognition for. . .the Palestinians deserve their liberty and equality unconditionally.” His grasp of English is pretty good. Now I need to hurry up and brush up on my Arabic, because I suck at speaking it.

Epic commercial break.

When the show finally comes back, Catherine Deneuve talks about A History of Violence.

Ah shit, my fingers hurt. I’m gonna just pump this bitch out as fast as I possibly can.

Julian McMahon and Rosario Dawson come out and John Williams wins in the Best Score category for Memoirs of a Geisha. According to the IMDb, there is 23 years between his last Globe win for E.T. and this win. He had been nominated numerous times in the years between.

Mariah Carey presents the award to Gustavo Santaolalla, in the Best Song category for “A Love That Will Never Grow Old” a song that he shares credit with Bernie Taupin for. Oh yeah, that song was written for Brokeback Mountain.
Anthony Hopkins gets the Cecil B. DeMille award, Lifetime Achievement, AKA the “you’re almost through, so we’ll hurry up and honor you” award. His speech is much shorter and much sweeter than I expect it to be. Would that I had the energy to transcribe every single word he said.

Mandy Moore does a great job talking up The Squid and the Whale.

Clint Eastwood feels lucky enough to be allowed to be a presenter for Best Director, which goes to Ang Lee. You could sense that he has almost perfected his ability to speak English, his occasional stammering being the result of nervousness more than anything else.

John Travolta gives the next eye-gouger to Pierce Brosnan for The Matador. Well, that’s how it happened in my hallucination. It actually goes to Joaquin Phoenix for Walk the Line.

Tim McGraw rubs more of Walk the Line in our faces, after the preceding commercial break.

Renee Zellwegger, looking even slimmer than the last time I saw her on TV, reads off the nominees for Best Film—Musical/Comedy. And we just know Walk the Line is gonna hit this one out of the ballpark.

Just 19 minutes from the last commercial, and already we have to brace ourselves for an onslaught of Lexus and Target ads. Some commercials are shown for the third time.

Main cast members from Will & Grace present Best TV Drama to Lost, and everybody—we’re talking whole tables of people here—crowd the stage. I almost made the mistake of assuming the stage wasn’t wide enough to accommodate everyone, and that some would have to share space with the teleprompter.

Dennis Quaid talks up Brokeback Mountain. I love the part where he says the genre of the film rhymes with “chick flick”. I guess that means it’s a “dick flick”. Heh heh.

Leonardo DiCaprio announces Felicity Huffman as the recipient, Best Actress (Drama), Transamerica. She sobs a little, but the Niagara Falls equipment is malfunctioning somehow.

Hilary Swank, after another round with the commercials, hands over the statuette to Philip Seymour Hoffman for Capote. Awesome speech from him.

A torrent of commercials later, Denzel Washington gets it over with by handing the Best Picture (Drama) statuette to the producers of Brokeback.

And seriously guys, I have just enough energy to type these final words. Between the commercials and the length of the awards show, and the probable length of the Oscars, I may not be doing this again. If I do, remind me to boil a gallon of coffee and hire a dozen ghostwriters. After all of that is done, I may have to buy new keyboards as well.

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