‘Barbie’ leads Golden Globe nominations followed by ‘Oppenheimer’

AP:

Greta Gerwig’s Barbie dominated the Golden Globe Awards nominations with nine nods for the blockbuster film, including Best Picture Musical or Comedy, as well as acting nominations for Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling and three of its original songs.

It was closely followed by its release date and meme companion Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, which scored eight nominations, including Best Picture Drama and for actors Cillian Murphy, Robert Downey Jr and Emily Blunt.

The revamped group, now a for-profit endeavour with a larger and more diverse voting body, announced nominations on Monday for its January awards show, after scandal and several troubled years, including one without a broadcast. Cedric the Entertainer and Wilmer Valderrama presided over the announcements from the Beverly Hilton Hotel, where the show will also take place on January 7.

Films nominated for Best Motion Picture Drama included 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 Air, American Fiction, The Holdovers, May December and Poor Things.

Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things and Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon both received seven nominations each. Poor Things saw nominations for Lanthimos, its actors Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, and Tony McNamara for screenplay. Killers of the Flower Moon got nods for Scorsese, for direction and co-writing the screenplay with Eric Roth, and stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Lily Gladstone and Robert De Niro.

Stone, who was also nominated for the Showtime series The Curse, said in a statement that she was “feeling extremely bewildered and thankful for it all”. She also said her Poor Things character Bella Baxter is her favourite and that she was “so grateful for the opportunity to be a part of this magical film experience”.

DiCaprio also used his statement to praise Gladstone: “She is the soul of our film and helped to bring this sinister and painful part of our nation’s history to life,” he wrote. The film is about the murders of wealthy Osage individuals in Oklahoma in the early 20th century.

Barbie tied for second-most nominations in Globes history with Cabaret, from 1972. Robert Altman’s Nashville remains the record holder with 11 nominations. It went into the morning as a favourite top, and got a big boost from its three original song nominations, including I’m Just Ken, and one of the year’s new categories, recognising cinematic and box office achievement. One person who was not nominated was America Ferrera, who delivered the movie’s most memorable monologue.

Succession was the top-nominated television programme with nine nods, including for series stars Brian Cox, Jeremy Strong, Sarah Snook and Kieran Culkin, followed by Hulu’s The Bear.

As always, there were some big surprises, like Jennifer Lawrence getting nominated for her bawdy R-rated comedy No Hard Feelings for best performance by a female actor in a musical or comedy. She was nominated alongside Robbie, Stone and Fantasia Barrino ( The Color Purple); Natalie Portman ( May December); and Alma Pöysti ( Fallen Leaves).

The Color Purple was expected to do better. The adaption of the stage musical got only two nominations total, both for actors, for Barrino and Danielle Brooks for her supporting performance. Left out was Colman Domingo, who was nominated for best drama actor for Rustin.

Cord Jefferson’s comedy American Fiction also came up with only two nods, best musical or comedy and for lead actor Jeffrey Wright.

Sofia Coppola’s widely acclaimed Priscilla got only one nomination, for actor Cailee Spaeny’s portrayal of Priscilla Presley. Her category mates in Best Female Performance in a drama include Gladstone, Annette Bening for Nyad, Sandra Hüller for Anatomy of a Fall, Greta Lee for Past Lives, and Carey Mulligan for Maestro.

The Globes won’t have to worry about anyone criticising its “all male” directors this year, however. Gerwig was nominated, as was Celine Song, for her romantic debut Past Lives, alongside Nolan, Scorsese, Cooper and Lanthimos.

The voting body has now grown to 300 members, following backlash to a 2021 report in the Los Angeles Times that found that there were zero Black members in the group that was then composed of only 87 foreign journalists.

The 81st Golden Globes will be the first major broadcast of awards season, with a new home on CBS, but no word on a host. And while to audiences it might look similar on the surface, it’s been tumultuous few years behind the scenes in the aftermath of the L.A. Times report, which also exposed ethical lapses like its members accepting lavish gifts and travel from awards publicists and studios.