Golden Globes announces nominees
Hollywood awards are so up for grabs these days that even Golden Globe voters were divided, picking seven nominees for best movie drama instead of the usual five.
The classy British drama “Atonement” received a leading seven nominations Thursday and joined such critical favorites as “No Country for Old Men” and “There Will Be Blood” as potential Academy Awards heavyweights.
Because of a three-way tie for fifth place, there were seven drama nominees in all, the others being the crime sagas “American Gangster” and “Eastern Promises,” the feel-good campus story “The Great Debaters” and the corporate-lawsuit drama “Michael Clayton.”
The just-released “Atonement” earned nominations for lead players Keira Knightley and James McAvoy, 13-year-old supporting actress Saoirse Ronan and director Joe Wright, along with screenwriting and musical score.
Golden Globe bids are considered a predictor of Oscar nominations, which come out Jan. 22, nine days after the Globes are presented.
Further confounding the crowded Oscar campaign is a strong lineup in the Golden Globes’ other best-picture category, for musical or comedy.
The Johnny Depp stage adaptation “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” could become the latest entry in a rebirth of the Hollywood movie musical to earn a best-picture Oscar nomination.
Along with best musical or comedy, “Sweeney Todd” earned acting nominations for Depp as the murderous title character and Helena Bonham Carter as his landlady, who serves the barber’s victims up in her meat pies. Tim Burton, Bonham Carter’s romantic partner, was nominated for director.
In addition to “Sweeney Todd,” scheduled for a Dec. 21 release, two other musicals – the Beatles romance “Across the Universe” and the Broadway adaptation “Hairspray” – were nominated in the musical or comedy category, along with the foreign-policy romp “Charlie Wilson’s War” and the teen-pregnancy tale “Juno.”
“Charlie Wilson’s War,” also due Dec. 21, ran second to “Atonement” with five nominations, among them acting honors for Oscar winners Tom Hanks as a congressman, Julia Roberts as a Texas socialite and Philip Seymour Hoffman as a slovenly CIA man who shape U.S. covert reaction to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
On the television side, if there was any doubt before, the Globe nominations sounded a clear message: This year, the best TV is on cable.
Broadcast networks scored only one-third of the 60 television nominations announced Thursday. Most of them went to ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy,” Fox’s “House” and NBC’s “30 Rock” (all of which won Globes last year) and ABC’s freshman series “Pushing Daisies.”
But cable was golden in the eyes of Globes judges, starting with FX’s low-rated but critically praised legal drama “Damages.” It landed four nominations: best drama series, lead actress (Glenn Close), supporting actress (Rose Byrne) and supporting actor (Ted Danson).
HBO typically looms large when nominations are announced, and this year is no different. It topped all networks with 18 nods, including best drama series for “Big Love” and best comedy for “Entourage.”
Best actress nominee Edie Falco got the sole nod directed toward HBO’s “The Sopranos” for its much-ballyhooed final season.
Showtime scored with two new series: “The Tudors,” nominated for best drama and best lead actor, Jonathan Rhys Meyers; and “Californication,” for both best comedy and its star, David Duchovny.
ABC led the broadcast networks with 11 nominations, though its past Globes darlings “Desperate Housewives” and “Lost” were ignored.
CBS almost got totally shut out; its lone nomination was for Sissy Spacek’s starring performance in the film “Pictures of Hollis Woods.”