Monday, 13 January 2014

Hollywood Babble On & On #1108: Golden Globes & Other Nonsense...

Last night Hollywood was honoured by a group of ninety or so people who call themselves journalists, but no one is really sure, at the Golden Globe awards.

First, I'll give you a list of winners & nominees and then a passing thought about some other nonsense.

Best Actress in a Supporting Role – Motion Picture

Sally Hawkins, “Blue Jasmine”
Jennifer Lawrence, “American Hustle” *WINNER
Lupita Nyong’o, “12 Years a Slave”
Julia Roberts, “August: Osage County”
June Squibb, “Nebraska”

Best Supporting Actress in a Series, Mini-Series, or TV Movie

Jacqueline Bisset, “Dancing on the Edge” *WINNER
Janet McTeer, “The White Queen”
Hayden Panettiere, “Nashville”
Monica Potter, “Parenthood”
Sofia Vergara, “Modern Family”

Best TV Miniseries or Movie

“American Horror Story: Coven”
“Behind the Candelabra” *WINNER
“Dancing on the Edge”
“Top of the Lake”
“White Queen”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television

Helena Bonham Carter, “Burton and Taylor”
Rebecca Ferguson, “White Queen”
Jessica Lange, “American Horror Story: Coven”
Helen Mirren, “Phil Spector”
Elisabeth Moss, “Top of the Lake” *WINNER

Best Actor in a TV series – Drama

Bryan Cranston, “Breaking Bad” *WINNER
Liev Schreiber, “Ray Donovan”
Michael Sheen, “Masters of Sex”
Kevin Spacey, “House of Cards”
James Spader, “The Blacklist”

Best TV Series – Drama

“Breaking Bad” *WINNER
“Downton Abbey”
“The Good Wife”
“House of Cards”
“Masters of Sex”

Best Original Score – Motion Picture

“All Is Lost” *WINNER
“Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom”
“Gravity”
“The Book Thief”
“12 Years a Slave”

Best Original Song – Motion Picture

“Atlas,” “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire,” Coldplay
“Let It Go,” “Frozen,” Idina Menzel
“Ordinary Love,” “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom,” U2 *WINNER
“Please Mr. Kennedy,” “Inside Llewyn Davis,” Justin Timberlake
“Sweeter Than Fiction,” “One Chance,” Taylor Swift

Best Supporting Actor in a Series – Mini-Series or TV Movie

Josh Charles, “The Good Wife”
Rob Lowe, “Behind the Candelabra”
Aaron Paul, “Breaking Bad”
Corey Stoll, “House of Cards”
Jon Voight, “Ray Donovan” *WINNER

Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical

Amy Adams, “American Hustle” *WINNER
Julie Delpy, “Before Midnight”
Greta Gerwig, “Frances Ha”
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, “Enough Said”
Meryl Streep, “August: Osage County”

Best Actress in a TV Series – Drama

Julianna Margulies, “The Good Wife”
Tatiana Maslany, “Orphan Black”
Taylor Schilling, “Orange is the New Black”
Kerry Washington, “Scandal”
Robin Wright, “House of Cards” *WINNER

Best Actor in a Supporting Role – Motion Picture

Barkhad Abdi, “Captain Phillips”
Daniel Bruhl, “Rush”
Bradley Cooper, “American Hustle”
Michael Fassbender, “12 Years a Slave”
Jared Leto, “Dallas Buyers Club” *WINNER

Best Screenplay – Motion Picture

Spike Jonze, “Her” *WINNER
Bob Nelson, “Nebraska”
Jeff Pope/Steve Coogan, “Philomena”
John Ridley, “12 Years a Slave”
David O. Russell, “American Hustle”

Best Actor – TV Series Comedy or Musical

Jason Bateman, “Arrested Development”
Don Cheadle, “House of Lies”
Michael J. Fox, “The Michael J. Fox Show”
Jim Parsons, “The Big Bang Theory”
Andy Samberg, “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” *WINNER

Best Foreign Language Film

“Blue Is The Warmest Color” (France)
“The Great Beauty” (Italy) *WINNER
“The Hunt” (Denmark)
“The Past” (Iran)
“The Wind Rises” (Japan)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television

Matt Damon, “Behind the Candelbra”
Michael Douglas, “Behind the Candelabra” *WINNER
Chiwetel Ejiofor, “Dancing on the Edge”
Idris Elba, “Luther”
Al Pacino, “Phil Spector”

Best Animated Feature Film

“The Croods”
“Despicable Me 2″
“Frozen” *WINNER

Best Actress in a TV Series – Comedy

Zooey Deschanel, “New Girl”
Edie Falco, “Nurse Jackie”
Lena Dunham, “Girls”
Julia Louis Dreyfus, “Veep”
Amy Poehler, “Parks and Recreation” *WINNER

Cecil B. DeMille Golden Globe Award

Woody Allen* WINNER

Best Director – Motion Picture

Alfonso Cuaron, “Gravity” *WINNER
Paul Greengrass, “Captain Phillips”
Steve McQueen, “12 Years a Slave”
Alexander Payne, “Nebraska”
David O. Russell, “American Hustle”

Best TV Series – Comedy

“The Big Bang Theory”
“Brooklyn Nine-Nine” *WINNER
“Girls”
“Modern Family”
“Parks and Recreation”

Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical

Christian Bale, “American Hustle”
Bruce Dern, “Nebraska”
Leonardo DiCaprio, “The Wolf of Wall Street” *WINNER
Oscar Isaac, “Inside Llewyn Davis”
Joaquin Phoenix, “Her”

Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy

“American Hustle” *WINNER
“Her”
“Inside Llewyn Davis”
“Nebraska”
“Wolf of Wall Street”

Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama

Cate Blanchett, “Blue Jasmine” *WINNER
Sandra Bullock, “Gravity”
Judy Dench, “Philomena”
Emma Thompson, “Saving Mr. Banks”
Kate Winslet, “Labor Day”

Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama

Chiwetel Ejiofor, “12 Years a Slave”
Idris Elba, “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom”
Tom Hanks, “Captain Phillips”
Matthew McConaughey, “Dallas Buyers Club” *WINNER
Robert Redford, “All Is Lost”


Best Motion Picture – Drama

“12 Years a Slave” *WINNER
“Captain Phillips”
“Gravity”
“Philomena”
“Rush”



OTHER NONSENSE

Now onto to the other nonsense, specifically the one featured in this tweet from Variety magazine



Pair that with this report where an unnamed reporter said to Lena Dunham the star/creator/writer of HBO's Girls: “I don’t get the purpose of all the nudity – particularly by you.”

It's a pretty stupid question. HBO is the home of pointless, purposeless nudity, but I think I know who if not actually asked that question, arranged for it to be asked: Lena Dunham's publicist.

Why?

Because Lena Dunham wants you to believe that she's just a "Jane Average" struggling to make it in an unfair world.

But it's a myth.

Compared to the thousands of women and men trying to make it as actors, writers, and filmmakers she's had it comparatively easy. Her family's at the centre of New York's extremely elite art scene, and while I'm sure he must have some talent, her social position has been what's made the career she has.

She made some films seen by hardly anyone outside her family's social circle, that got her a TV show, watched by hardly anyone outside her social circle, but it keeps on getting renewed, and she gets multi-million dollar book deals on top of it, because the top level of that social circle like that the lesser members praise it for its "courage."

For it to be courageous Miss Dunham needs to be seen as an "everywoman" and Hollywood "outsider" who is being "bullied" by those crass philistines who don't "get" her and her work.

So you get her saying things about eating a "thick patty of hamburger meat" before a big name awards show hoping it'll make her sound like one of us normals.  But something doesn't ring true about that quote, if it's accurate, because us normals don't say "patty of hamburger meat" we just say "a hamburger."

Well, that's not entirely true. Most normals wouldn't say they did that right before a big public event for fear of looking like a rube. But it's something that someone who has lived entirely of the Axis of Ego might think is something they would say.

And I think that's why she has yet to enjoy any success with the mainstream.

Dunham comes across as a character from an old movie or TV show who comes from a snobby upper class caricature culture who is trying to communicate with the "yokels" by pretending to be one of them, but not getting the slang and the idioms right.

So, someone asks a stupid pseudo-question about her doing pointless nudity on the pointless nudity channel, and abracadabra she's no longer  a child of relative privilege who became Hollywood's darling. Now she's a poor, downtrodden victim of a harsh sexist, misogynist, society that is also too stupid to realize that she's being "real."

Too bad it won't work with the mainstream audience, because her "real" strikes them as phoney. At least among those who actually notice her.

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