The Golden Globes of the pandemic: more influential and controversial than ever

The red carpet of the Golden Globes in the last edition of 2010. Jordan Strauss / GTRES

It is traditionally one of the most chaotic awards galas and this year promises to be even more so.

The 78th edition of the Golden Globes will offer this Sunday a new experiment in how to hold an awards gala in the midst of a pandemic.

The coronavirus, in addition to causing the delay of the appointment, provides the show this year with the logical challenges derived from the absence of an audience and the fact that the nominees will participate remotely.

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As if this were not enough, the organizers have found it a good idea to divide the ceremony between two venues located at both ends of the country.

Tina Fey and Amy Poehler are back together at the Golden Globes, but only on screen: physically, the former will practice from New York and the latter from Los Angeles.

The presenters of the different awards - Michael Douglas, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Joaquin Phoenix and Renee Zellweger, among others - will also be physically distributed between the two venues.

In both, the public will be limited to a small number of front-line workers of the pandemic.

The presenters will introduce the prizes of each category in person, each one from one end of the country, and the winners will thank them virtually, from their homes, in whatever time slot they are.

Thus, for example, Amanda Seyfried, nominated in the category of supporting actress for

Mank,

has advanced that she will be on the sofa in the living room of her house with her family, including her dog and her five-month-old baby.

Difficult, with these conditions, to expect something similar to the spectacle of a red carpet.

This double somersault becomes triple if one takes into account that this year, more than ever, the very reputation of the Golden Globes is also at stake, awards granted by the often criticized Hollywood Foreign Press Association, a group of 87 international journalists living in Southern California.

A recent

Los Angeles Times

journalistic investigation

revealed that the voting cast does not include any black people, and it so happens that at least four movies directed by and starring African Americans, which were expected to be among the nominees, fell outside the categories of best film.

In addition, the investigation uncovered a pattern of inappropriate payments to members, which was already an open secret in the world.

For example, he found that several of the voters enjoyed a luxurious trip to Paris, staying in a $ 1,400-a-night hotel, paid by the producers to promote the

Emily in Paris

series

,

which despite half-hearted criticism has ended up being made. with two nominations.

The truth is that its proximity to the Oscars, which this year are delivered on April 25, makes the Golden Globes an opportunity to generate noise around certain titles and place favorite labels.

And this year, due to the dance of dates caused by the pandemic,

Variety

magazine's own film awards editor

,

Clayton Davis, assures that the Golden Globes will have more influence than ever at the Oscars.

The members of the Academy vote for the nominees between March 5 and 10, that is, just five days after the Golden Globes. Other awards with a tradition of influencing the decision of academics, such as those of the unions of directors and producers or the Baftas, will announce their nominations this year in the middle of the period that academics have to vote, and in some cases already after this.

"The Golden Globes will thus be the last televised industry event held before voters receive their ballots," Davis writes.

Members not very active journalistically

In addition to providing momentum for the Oscars, the Golden Globes launch races, award pedigree stamps for posters and resumes, and stimulate the box office.

And they also make the members of the Association, professionals who are not necessarily very active journalistically, into the object of desire of the machinery for promoting studies, which tend to treat them with gifts that are not compatible with what would be ethically required of a jury of awards so important to the industry.

Studies tend to prioritize, in interviews with stars, members of the Association, even if they do not work actively or regularly for any weight medium.

And managers have been accused of resistance and arbitrariness in admitting new members, to the point that last year a Norwegian journalist sued the Association after being denied admission three times.

The Association was born in the 1940s, when a group of foreign correspondents in Hollywood came together to gain weight that would give them more access to performers and directors.

Centered on the stars and without the most boring technical categories, the televised broadcast of the Golden Globes soon became a success.

Its more casual and irreverent style, in contrast to the solemnity of the Oscars, has made the ceremony the third most watched awards gala on television in the United States, after the Grammy and the awards themselves of the Film Academy.

In 2018, NBC agreed to pay 60 million dollars a year for television rights and the audience, unlike the Oscars and the Grammys, which tend to decline, remains stable between 18 and 20 million viewers.

Every year it is remembered that the appointment should be taken more as a mere celebration than as some weighty artistic awards.

"The Golden Globes are to the Oscars what Kim Kardashian is to Kate Middleton," Ricky Gervais summed up at the 2012 ceremony, which has presented numerous editions of the gala.

Before and after each edition, the specialized press and the world of Hollywood gloat in their own jokes about the extravagance of some of the nominations and the supposed irrelevance of the awards.

But they will all be there this Sunday, one more year, to cover it and comment on it.