The 2017 Golden Globe Awards honored some of Hollywood’s most deserving last night, including shows and people featuring LGBT women, women of color and allies. Jimmy Fallon hosted the show, filling his opening musical segment with some homoerotic flirting with Ryan Reynolds and Justin Timberlake. In his monologue, he made some jokes about the election, calling the Golden Globes “one of the few places left where America still honors the popular vote” and likening the President-elect as King Joffrey from “Game of Thrones.”
The most talked about moment of the night was undeniably Meryl Streep’s speech given after being honored with the Cecil B. DeMille Award. An excerpt from her passionate delivery:
“They gave me three seconds to say this, so: An actor’s only job is to enter the lives of people who are different from us, and let you feel what that feels like. And there were many, many, many powerful performances this year that did exactly that. Breathtaking, compassionate work.
But there was one performance this year that stunned me. It sank its hooks in my heart. Not because it was good; there was nothing good about it. But it was effective, and it did its job. It made its intended audience laugh, and show their teeth. It was that moment when the person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter. Someone he outranked in privilege, power and the capacity to fight back. It kind of broke my heart when I saw it, and I still can’t get it out of my head, because it wasn’t in a movie. It was real life. And this instinct to humiliate, when it’s modeled by someone in the public platform, by someone powerful, it filters down into everybody’s life, because it kinda gives permission for other people to do the same thing. Disrespect invites disrespect; violence incites violence. And when the powerful use their position to bully others we all lose. O.K., go on with it.
O.K., this brings me to the press. We need the principled press to hold power to account, to call him on the carpet for every outrage. That’s why our founders enshrined the press and its freedoms in the Constitution. So I only ask the famously well-heeled Hollywood Foreign Press and all of us in our community to join me in supporting the Committee to Protect Journalists, because we’re gonna need them going forward, and they’ll need us to safeguard the truth.
One more thing: Once, when I was standing around on the set one day, whining about something — you know we were gonna work through supper or the long hours or whatever, Tommy Lee Jones said to me, ‘Isn’t it such a privilege, Meryl, just to be an actor?’ Yeah, it is, and we have to remind each other of the privilege and the responsibility of the act of empathy. We should all be proud of the work Hollywood honors here tonight.
As my friend, the dear departed Princess Leia, said to me once, take your broken heart, make it into art.”
Donald Trump responded with a series of classless tweets in which he referred to Meryl as “one of the most over-rated actresses in Hollywood,” but many others have shown their support of Meryl, including Emmy Rossum, Anna Kendrick, Laverne Cox and Gina Rodriguez.
The night’s winners include out actress Sarah Paulson (Best Performance by an Actress In A Mini-series or Motion Picture Made for Television), who also took the stage with her “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story” castmates to accept Best Television Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television. She thanked out EP Nina Jacobson as well as the rest of the cast and crew, including gay director Ryan Murphy. She ended the speech with a tribute to fierce attorney who she played in the mini-series.
“To the remarkable Marcia Clark, you are an inspiration to me,” Sarah said. “If I could live my life with a fraction of your wit, integrity, and your unapologetic fierceness, I would be on the road to doing it right.”
Sarah also got tongues wagging after kissing best friend Amanda Peet on the red carpet. Her partner, Holland Taylor, was not in attendance but tweeted her excitement about the win as well as Meryl Streep’s moving speech.
Nina Jacobson took the mic to read the acceptance speech for “The People v. O.J. Simpson” win, thanking her “wife, kids and mom.”
Known ally and star of “Black-ish” Tracee Ellis Ross took home Best Actress, Television Series Comedy or Musical, the first black woman to win the category since 1983. She dedicated her win to women of color and colorful people “whose stories, ideas, thoughts are not always considered worthy and valid and important. But I want you to know that I see you. We see you.”
Viola Davis won Best Supporting Actress for her role in “Fences,” an August Wilson Broadway play-turned-film. Viola also won the Critics Choice award for her role as Rose Maxson in the 1950s-themed drama, her first Golden Globe win after four previous nominations. “But it’s right on time,” she said.
FX’s “Atlanta” also took home two wins for Best Comedy and Best Actor Donald Glover, who thanked the black people of Atlanta and was genuinely surprised at the Best Comedy win saying, “We didn’t think anybody was gonna like this show.”
Queer-themed feature “Moonlight” won Best Drama, signifying the Golden Globe voters are finally voting more inclusively and celebrating more diverse stories. Backstage, star Janelle Monae told the press she was proud to be a part of the winning film.
“I’m pro love,” she said. “I’ve been very supportive of love, and at the end of the day I think that no matter where you come from and who you love, you deserve a chance at the American dream and to have your story told.”
Although out actress Evan Rachel Wood didn’t take home any wins for “Westworld,” she stunned in a suit, telling red carpet reporters why she felt it was important to wear something other than a dress to such an event.
“This is my third nomination,” Wood said. “I’ve been to the Globes six times. I’ve worn a dress every time. And I love dresses. I’m not trying to protest dresses. But I want to make sure that young girls and women know they aren’t a requirement and that you don’t have to wear one if you don’t want to. Just be yourself, because your worth is more than that. Anybody who is representing hate is part of the problem. I hope that we can all remember that at the end of the day, we all bleed the same color.”
Other winning women include Claire Foy (Best Actress in a Drama Series, “The Crown”), Olivia Colman ( Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television, “The Night Manager”), Emma Stone (Best Actress in a comedy/musical, “La La Land”), and Isabelle Huppert (Best Actress, Drama, “Elle”).
For a full list of winners, visit GoldenGlobes.com.
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