Showing posts with label Golden Globes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Golden Globes. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 11, 2019

What’s Up With That?

I feel obligated—even as a person who came to HBO’s Game of Thrones very late in the game—to mention how surprised I was to hear of the series only being nominated for one Golden Globe award. I’m sure a lot of fans are similarly surprised, if not shocked. This is not to take anything away from anyone else who may have been nominated: I’m sure there are many deserving individuals and projects, and obviously there’s a certain amount of subjectivity in any awards selection process. Having said all that, I still say that something about this doesn’t seem to add up. Not even nominated, with the exception of one acting nomination for Kit Harington? With extremely high production values across the board and an excellent cast from top to bottom?

Of course, you know I’m old and cynical, but it almost seems to me that GOT and/or the people behind it must have gotten on someone’s blacklist. Maybe you’re about to suggest some other programs I might want to see that you consider superior to GOT, and I won’t argue with anyone’s choices—but if there truly are that many programs equal to or better than a cultural behemoth like GOT, I’m stunned. Television as a whole must be more quality-based than I realized.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve started to look at many things differently, and my pleasure in watching awards programs is never really unalloyed. Hollywood is just as political as any other place, if not more so, and you have to wonder what goes on behind the scenes of some of the industry organizations. The degree to which people respect the institutions and the nominating processes determines the actual and perceived value of winning—after all, who wants to be the recipient of a rigged award? Nobody wins in that case.

It’s possible that some Hollywood Foreign Press Association members thought GOT had peaked already and regarded the last season as less worthy of recognition based on all the fan controversies about unexpected plot developments and the respective fates of various characters, although to me that should have little bearing on the way an industry organization chooses to recognize quality. Some of the conversation about story directions got rather heated at the time, which is kind of understandable considering how many loyal viewers the program had and how embedded GOT was in the cultural psyche over the course of its run. Naturally, fans have opinions, which weren’t always expressed graciously but sprang, I think, from a genuine love for the series and a reluctance to see it end at all, much less in a way unfavorable to beloved characters.

I had much less invested in this series than people who had watched it from the beginning, but I still found myself developing favorites and feeling that I would be unhappy if this person or that person didn’t survive the Battle of Winterfell or the Battle at King’s Landing—in fact, I wasn’t happy with the final outcome on some levels, although that didn’t stop me from thinking the episodes were quite well done. I actually admired the show’s writers for having the courage to make some controversial choices, and certainly having everyone anyone remotely liked survive would not have seemed realistic either.

I would think fans would be more up-in-arms about GOT being nearly excluded from awards in its final season than they are about unpopular plot choices. Although it would make no difference in decisions that have already been made and would be largely symbolic, to me it would be more appropriate to start a petition scolding the Hollywood Foreign Press Association for overlooking, in its final season, one of the finest and most well-produced spectacles ever to hit the small screen than to continue to agitate for rewrites. I mean, the opening credits! The dragons, my God! The battles! The cinematography! The costumes! The dialogue! Good heavens, it boggles the mind.

Like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid of an earlier era, I’m having to ask myself, of the HFPA, “Who are those guys?” Did they collectively drink a six-pack apiece and pass out during the screenings? Did they read the Cliff Notes version of the scripts? Did they have a mass hallucination?

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Getting the Box

I have television again for the first time since last February. A friend who knows how much I love the Olympics offered to pick up a converter box at Radio Shack and set it up for me so I'd be ready for the Vancouver Games. Wonderful! I've been dithering for months, not able to decide if I should get cable or go with the box. I had heard that some people got bad reception with a converter box, but I didn't like the idea of paying for cable.

I'm probably unusual in the fact that never in my adult life have I had cable TV, except for a brief period years ago when my apartment building was being renovated after a fire. My room at Extended Stay America had cable, and I watched TV all summer. I was surprised at how fast I got hooked on certain things. I could watch The Weather Channel by the hour, and Animal Planet had the power to nearly hypnotize me, especially if the program featured puppies or kittens. I decided it wasn't something I needed long-term.

I grew up watching television, which didn't prevent me from also reading a lot. I've never liked being without a TV; it's always nice to be able to switch it on, even if you don't do it often. The longest summer of my life was my first summer away from home, after my junior year of college, in my first apartment -- with no TV. This last year, I hardly missed it, since I didn't have the spare time to watch it anyway. But after Steve got the box set up yesterday and the picture suddenly came on, crystal-clear and sharp, I was pleasantly surprised. It's nice to have this eye on the world open once again.

So what am I doing with my first night of TV in almost a year, my dissertation clock ticking in the background? OK, I admit it. I'm not watching the MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour, I'm watching movie stars accepting Golden Globes, with the sound turned down (I did turn it up to listen to Meryl Streep accept an award for Julie and Julia and to hear Martin Scorsese speak). I don't think I've ever watched this show before, but it's actually livelier than the Oscars. On a rainy winter night, after a sad week in the world, it's fun to see some sparkle and color.

If movies are the modern version of fairy tales, this awards ceremony is a little like seeing a raft of characters from Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen show up all together at Cinderella's ball: it may be a little awkward, but it's magical (and the ball gowns are half the fun). As a testament to the primacy of films in the public imagination, I can say that despite three years of having my nose in the books for graduate school, I recognize nearly all of the faces, old and new.

The only ones I don't recognize are from television, and even some of them look familiar.