BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – The Golden Globe Awards are back on Sunday, with plenty of behind-the-scenes changes aimed at cementing a yearslong comeback effort.
The show is known for its boozy celebration of film and television and as an early stop for awards season contenders. Scandals have led to a membership revamp and a new broadcaster for the Jan. 7 show, but a key question remains: Will viewers tune in? The show certainly is betting on it, unveiling a starry list of presenters including the likes of Oprah Winfrey, Michelle Yeoh, Ben Affleck and Dua Lipa.
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Here’s what to know about the 81st Golden Globe Awards.
HOW CAN I WATCH THE GOLDEN GLOBES?
Viewers in the United States can catch the ceremony, broadcast live from the Beverly Hilton hotel, beginning at 8 p.m. Eastern. It will air beginning at 5 p.m. on the West Coast.
Here's more information about how to watch the Golden Globes live, including streaming the red carpet and backstage interviews.
WHAT’S NEW WITH THE GOLDEN GLOBES?
It will be the first major broadcast of awards season, with a new home on CBS. And while to audiences it might look similar on the surface, it’s been a tumultuous few years behind the scenes following a bombshell report in the Los Angeles Times. The 2021 report found that there were no Black members in the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which voted on the awards.
Stars and studios boycotted the Globes and NBC refused to air it in 2022 as a result. After the group added journalists of color to its ranks and instituted other reforms to address ethical concerns, the show came back last January in a one-year probationary agreement with NBC. The network did not opt to renew.
In June, billionaire Todd Boehly was granted approval to dissolve the HFPA and reinvent the Golden Globes as a for-profit organization. Its assets were acquired by Boehly’s Eldridge Industries, along with Dick Clark Productions, a group owned by Penske Media — whose assets also include Variety, Deadline, The Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone and Billboard.
The show has also added a new award for stand-up comedy, with Chris Rock, Amy Schumer and former Globes host Ricky Gervais among the nominees.
WHO'S HOSTING THE GLOBES?
Comedian Jo Koy, who has headlined several Netflix specials and starred in last year's comedy film “Easter Sunday,” will host the Globes.
Organizers cited his “infectious energy and relatable humor" in announcing Koy would headline the event.
Hosting the Globes typically requires serving a mix of biting humor to the audience of film and television stars and keeping the ceremony from getting too sloppy. Koy promised to deliver, in an interview with The Associated Press.
“They’re giving me the blessing to be me,” he said. “I want to bring my style to the Globes. Of course, I’m going to have fun. But most importantly, I want to make sure everyone’s happy. I’m going to make fun of myself. If I can do that, I can make fun of other people.”
WHO'S PRESENTING AT THE GLOBES?
The full list of presenters was unveiled Friday, following an early peek Wednesday.
Yeoh is returning to the Globes a year after she won best actress in a drama film for “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” delivering a poignant acceptance speech (and a semi-serious threat to beat up the piano player who started to cut her off).
Other presenters announced include Angela Bassett, Matt Damon, Florence Pugh, Annette Bening, Mark Hamill, Kevin Costner, Jonathan Bailey, Orlando Bloom and Will Ferrell.
GOLDEN GLOBE NOMINEES
“Barbie” is the top nominee this year, followed closely by “Oppenheimer.”
The films reflect one unique aspect of the Globes — they split the top film winners into two categories. With Greta Gerwig's “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan's “Oppenheimer” leading the way, it gives the show a chance to capitalize on the Barbenheimer craze that boosted theaters.
Films nominated for best motion picture drama include “Oppenheimer,” Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” Bradley Cooper’s “Maestro,” Celine Song’s “Past Lives,” Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall” and Jonathan Glazer’s “The Zone of Interest.”
In the best motion picture musical or comedy category, “Barbie” was joined by Ben Affleck's “Air,” Cord Jefferson's “American Fiction,” Alexander Payne's “The Holdovers,” Todd Haynes' “May December” and Yorgos Lanthimos' “Poor Things.”
“Succession” was the top-nominated television program, with nine nods including for series stars Brian Cox, Jeremy Strong, Sarah Snook and Kieran Culkin, followed by Hulu’s “The Bear.”
For the full list of nominees, click here.
WHO VOTES ON THE GLOBES?
The group nominating and voting for the awards is now made up of a more diverse group of over 300 people from around the world.
WHAT ARE THE GLOBES KNOWN FOR?
The Golden Globe Awards had long been one of the highest-profile awards season broadcasts, second only to the Oscars.
The show was touted as an A-list party whose hosts often took a more irreverent tone than their Academy counterparts. It also only honored the flashiest filmmaking categories — picture, director, actors among them — meaning no long speeches from visual effects supervisors or directors of little-known shorts.
But the voting body was a small group of around 87 members who wielded incredible influence in the industry and often accepted lavish gifts and travel from studios and awards publicists eager to court favor and win votes.
Some years, the HFPA were pilloried for nominating poorly reviewed films with big-name talent in hopes of getting them to the show — the most infamous being “The Tourist,” with Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp. In the past decade, they’ve more often overlapped with the Oscars. The show also recognizes television.
Before the expose and public relations crisis though, no one in the industry took much umbrage with who was voting on the awards. The show had become an important part of the Hollywood awards ecosystem, a platform for Oscar hopefuls and was, until recently, a reliable ratings draw. As of 2019, the broadcast was still pulling in nearly 19 million viewers. In 2023, NBC’s Tuesday night broadcast got its smallest audience ever for a traditional broadcast, with 6.3 million viewers.