Chloé Zhao and Andra Day made history at last night’s Golden Globe Awards. Zhao became the first woman director to claim the Best Director prize since Barbra Streisand took home the honor in 1984 for “Yentl,” and the first WOC to ever win the award. Day’s win for Best Actress in a Drama makes her the second-ever Black actress to top the category and the first since Whoopi Goldberg won in 1986 for “The Color Purple.”
“Sometimes a first feels like a long time coming. I’m sure there are many others before me that deserve the same recognition,” Zhao said in the awards’ virtual press room following her win, per The Hollywood Reporter. The “Nomadland” writer-director added, “I just love what I do, I just really love it. If this means more people like me get to live their dream and get to do what I do, I’m happy.”
Zhao was one of three women up for Best Director this year. She was nominated alongside “One Night in Miami’s” Regina King and “Promising Young Woman’s” Emerald Fennell.
“Nomadland” also won Best Motion Picture – Drama. Set in the aftermath of the Great Recession, the drama tells the story of Fern, a 60-something woman who moves into her camper van and travels across the American West, meeting up with a community of nomads.
Day was recognized for her leading role in Billie Holiday biopic “The United States vs. Billie Holiday,” a portrait of the “Strange Fruit” singer and civil rights activist that also scored a Best Original Song nod.
“The thing I take from Billie more than anything is the strength of a Black woman,” Day said in the press room. “To know that the last person who won this award was Whoopi Goldberg in ‘The Color Purple’ is so not representative of how many Black women’s stories have been told sensationally and need to be told by the amazing talented actresses who do this.” She recalled, “On set, they’d say, ‘Don’t worry, you’ll never have to go through this again. There’s not that many meaty roles for Black women.’ And I go, ‘Who the hell else has meatier roles and meatier stories than Black women?’ So I take that strength with me. [Billie Holiday] shouldered all of this all on her own. She is the godmother of civil rights and I take that strength with me.”
The 78th edition of the Globes came on the heels of major controversy. A recent Los Angeles Times exposé revealed that the body behind the Globes, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA), includes exactly zero Black members. Hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler addressed the scandal during their opening monologue. “Everybody is understandably upset at the HFPA and their choices,” said Poehler. “Look, a lot of flashy garbage got nominated but that happens. That’s like their thing, but a number of Black actors and Black-led projects were overlooked.” Fey acknowledged that “award shows are stupid,” but emphasized that “even with stupid things, inclusivity is important.”
A number of winners also criticized the HFPA, including “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan’s” Sacha Baron Cohen, who began his speech by thanking the “all-white” HFPA.
A select number of HFPA members appeared on-screen and emphasized the importance of addressing the org’s lack of inclusivity within its ranks — an issue that’s been a problem for many years, but is only now being publicly called out. Though it felt like little more than a hollow gesture, HFPA was forced to recognize its failings on its own stage, and regardless of whether they are truly committed to doing better, as they claimed, more folks will be holding them accountable amidst the backlash.
While accepting the Cecil B. DeMille award, Jane Fonda spoke to the power of inclusion and called on the industry to evolve. She urged Hollywood to “expand that tent” of who is allowed to tell stories in the industry. “Stories, they can really change people. But there’s a story we’ve been afraid to see and hear about ourselves in this industry, a story about which voices we respect and elevate and which we tune out, a story about who is offered a seat at the table and who is kept out of the rooms where decisions are made,” she observed.
The “Grace and Frankie” star called on everyone, “including all the groups that decide who gets hired and what gets made and who wins awards,” to include all voices. She also highlighted some of her favorite titles from the year, such as “Nomadland,” “Minari, “The U.S. vs. Billie Holiday,” “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” and “One Night in Miami,” saying that some of the films “‘have deepened [her] empathy for what being Black has meant.”
According to the Times, Fonda emphasized the need for change during a Zoom roundtable with HFPA members the week before. “I must say, get more women. I’m only the 17th time that a woman has won [the Cecil B. DeMille Award]. And also, we need to help you get more Black members.”
Head over to Variety for the full list of Golden Globe winners.
