This Week in Gossip #10

The Golden Globes did not suck, AI continues to be a scourge, Tom teams up with Zaslav, and the Exorcist franchise fizzles.

1. The Golden Globes Managed to Be Reasonably Respectable For Once

I’ve made it clear many times over the course of my career that I think the Golden Globes are pointless. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has spent decades being shameless in its star-f*cking, using a boozy awards show as an excuse for a handful of journalists with questionable credentials to mingle with A-listers. The accusations of bribery and favouritism were rampant long before the organization fell under fire for its total absence of Black members. Now, they’ve fallen under new management – which helps to bolster an already overpowered media monopoly for Penske – moved to a new channel and are hoping to sell themselves as respectable. I still have questions, especially after that acquisition, but in terms of who they decided to award this year, I’ve no complaints.

Oppenheimer was the major winner, taking home Best Motion Picture (Drama), Best Director for Christopher Nolan, and acting trophies for both Cillian Murphy and Robert Downey Jr. The brilliant Lily Gladstone, who gave my favourite performance of 2023, won Best Actress in a Drama for Killers of the Flower Moon and her speech was sublime. Succession and The Bear, of course, swept in the major TV categories. Poor Things was dominant as the film comedy/musical choice, winning over Barbie in a major way. Barbie did win that new award for box office achievement, although I would argue that the billion dollar gross was itself the award. To quote Don Draper, that’s what the money’s for. I hated Maestro so I am petty enough to admit that Bradley Cooper’s stony face throughout the night as the movie won zero awards made me laugh.

The Globes has always marketed itself on two qualities: one, being the cooler sibling to the Oscars, and two, being the first true precursor to the Academy in terms of predicting the winners of the top prize. The latter has never really been true for reasons I’ll get into, but the former works mostly because of the winners. They’re drinking, they’re more relaxed, and they get that this ceremony is kind of ridiculous. The speeches make the occasion, whether it’s Cillian Murphy having his wife’s lipstick on his nose or Kieran Culkin playfully mocking Pedro Pascal. They certainly did better than Jo Koy, the comedian who was tapped in to host the Globes at the last minute. You know your show isn’t going well when you keep berating the audience for not laughing at your jokes. Hosting awards show is mostly a thankless endeavour but the Globes often gives comedians a chance to loosen up. Jerrod Carmichael did a great job last year by repeatedly calling out the HFPA’s failings, for example. Granted, Koy had less than a fortnight to prepare for this, but that doesn’t really excuse weak and predictable jokes or the overall sense of flop-sweat desperation that was conveyed.

As for being the first true Oscars precursor? The Globes’ reputation there has long been exaggerated. Last year, for example, they only awarded Everything Everywhere All at Once in two acting categories and spread more love to The Fabelmans and The Banshees of Inisherin, both of which the Oscars ignored on the big night. They only nominated All Quiet on the Western Front in the non-English language category and that went on to become one of the biggest winners of the season. Being first doesn’t make you the most accurate and the narratives it establishes are easily changed over the coming weeks. Cooper getting snubbed here doesn’t mean he’s going home empty handed on Oscar night, at least not now.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt to have another trophy on your shelf, or an extra opportunity to let the world see you. How many Academy voters saw Lily Gladstone’s beautiful speech and were reminded of her excellent work? The season is still young. There is plenty of time for the story to change. I hope that means more love for Todd Haynes, at the very least. Come on, world, don’t do this to May December!

2. Am I Allowed to Admit That I Think Kylie and Timothee Are Cute Together?

Timothee Chalamet took Kylie Jenner as his date to the Golden Globes and the two were thick as thieves all night. The camera caught them in the midst of an ooey-gooey “I love you/I love you more” chat, which was pure cute cringe. The pair have been dating for a few months now, mostly keeping out of the public eye aside from a couple of notable public appearances at events like the Renaissance Tour and U.S. Open. The internet is, predictably, extremely abnormal about this.

Look, I have no horse in this race. I’m not a Kardashian-Jenner fan and I think Chalamet is talented but a tad overhyped. Still, I have to admit that I think they’re cute together. They’re two rich and hot twentysomethings hanging out and clearly enjoying one another’s company. This seems like the kind of low-stakes celebrity romance people can root for. But nobody is ever normal about an internet boyfriend being seen in public with someone of the opposite gender. Club Chalamet, the 57-year-old stan who literally grabs this man at red carpet events, has spent months calling Jenner a stalker who is keeping her favourite captive. His subreddit is acting as though they caught Chalamet f*cking a moose. The “it’s all for PR” accusations are flying thick and fast. Things were made all the more scandalous when the cameras apparently caught Selena Gomez telling Taylor Swift that Kylie had blocked her attempt to get a photograph with Timothee, her co-star on that Woody Allen movie they’re all pretending never happened. I’m not sure how any amateur lip reader got that conclusion from what they saw, and the perennially online Gomez had sources rush to People to let them know she didn’t speak to Chalamet all night anyway. Oh the drama.

I don’t think you have to be a fan of Kylie Jenner to note how misogynistic it is to smear her as some talentless hanger-on who must have somehow trapped poor defenceless Oscar-nominee Timmy into dating her. There’s this prevailing fandom idea that Chalamet is a sensitive intellectual who is clearly above a reality TV star who sells make-up, but it doesn’t gel with the reality of a New York goofball who likes rap music, does jokes on SNL, and has no qualms about being cringe as f*ck. This infantilizing of a grown man is always gross and is pretty common with fandoms, especially when it comes to their love lives. We see this all the time, whether it’s those weirdos who claimed Olivia Wilde was “grooming” Harry Styles, a man close to 30 at the time, or Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith. How telling that Jenner is seen as the “slut” here when her dating history is far scanter than Chalamet’s.