The Golden Globes took place on Jan. 5, and I, along with countless others, felt that many wins were misplaced. This has been a growing trend in the past year and a half from out-of-touch critics, from the “Barbie” movie’s message being proven by winning just one of nine Oscar nominations it received, to “The Great Gatsby” musical receiving just one Tony nomination for costume design while featuring some of the biggest Broadway stars of the decade.
I feel that I should first mention “Wicked: Part 1” nominations for Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, Best Musical or Comedy, and Cinematic and Box Office Achievement, and the fact that it only took home the Box Office Achievement. As someone who loves musicals, many movie adaptations of stage performances are disappointing, and “Wicked” was certainly not one of them. Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande play our favorite Ozian witches with such elegance, it seems incredible to me that neither of them won the awards for which they were nominated, and that the film’s astounding box office numbers were not enough to prove that it deserved to win Best Musical or Comedy.
This is all without mentioning John M. Chu’s complete lack of a Golden Globe nod, when he has directed incredible movie adaptations of two of the most famous musicals of this century so far: “Wicked” and “In the Heights.”
The HBO show “Hacks” won Best Television Series in the Musical or Comedy category. I have never even heard of it, and I feel as though the most popular or best television series or movies are the ones that everybody has heard of, regardless of whether or not they’ve seen them. Especially when every other show on that list—“Abbott Elementary,” “The Bear,” “The Gentlemen,” “Nobody Wants This,” and “Only Murders in the Building”—are extremely popular and well-done shows that I, sheltered and one-track-minded as I am, have heard of.
“Hacks” also won Best Performance by an Actress for Jean Smart’s performance. She must have put on an incredible show, because Kristen Bell, Quinta Brunson, Ayo Edibiri, Selena Gomez, and Kathryn Hahn, all lost for their respective shows. I have seen all of these shows and can attest to the wonderful performances of these actresses and how astonishing their losses are.
Let’s just say I don’t envy these critics—although, they have been incredibly detached as of late, and I’m sure high schoolers would do their jobs much better.
Incredible productions were robbed this Golden Globe award season, from movies like “Challengers,” to shows like “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” as well as actors and actresses like Sebastian Stan and Zendaya. I’m sure all of the winning films and series are great, but as almost everyone I’ve spoken to hasn’t seen them, the question begs: are critics too out of touch?
