Taylor Swift needed to read the room at the Golden Globes, and I don’t think Jo Koy is the one who owes anybody an apology.
The Golden Globes just happened, so award season has begun, and this is the show it begins with. The Globes have had a very tumultuous background in terms of what people thought they were. It used to be the Hollywood Foreign Press. Now it’s a slightly different name and a different way they do the awards. But it’s still the Globes, and it’s still the first one out of the gate.
This one’s pulled from the live show, so I couldn’t edit, and my co-host was right there with me on it.
Jo Koy Didn’t Get a Fair Shake
A lot of people gave Jo Koy such crap for hosting, and my co-host came in defending him. She sees why he got it. But he’s a really funny comedian, and her read is that either they wrote his stuff or they wrote half of it, and the half he didn’t write, he didn’t know how to deliver. She feels bad for him, and she doesn’t think he got a fair shake. Were people just expecting Ricky Gervais to do it all over again?
I don’t know what people expect, though. At the end of the day the Golden Globes has always been the less formal one. Yes, it’s the ushering in of award season, but it’s way less formal than what everybody would expect from the Oscars. I do feel like he got a really bad deal.
Part of the problem I had with Jo is that he didn’t lean into it enough. I think that might have been the real criticism. He didn’t lean into it the way previous hosts did.
The Cut to Taylor Swift
Then there’s the Taylor Swift situation. He made a joke about the cameras, they cut to Taylor Swift, and we’ve all seen the meme. It was rough.
My co-host felt so bad for him and didn’t feel bad for her at all. I’ll tell you up front what I told her when we talked about it that morning, which is that she woke up angry. She said I was probably right.
Her case goes like this. Taylor Swift is a wonderful businessperson. She doesn’t love all of the music, but family back home in Chicago does. What Swift did bringing her concert to the movie theater was amazing, and she did it on her own. Ticket prices to go see a concert these days are astronomical, just ridiculously expensive. So if you can bring your six year old, your seven year old, your eight or nine year old to a movie theater where, from what friends and family told her, it was like being at the concert, with people standing and singing, that’s wonderful. She did a great job.
However. The minute she pops into the spotlight, she’s going to have a camera in her face 24/7. Yes, paparazzi need to be careful and show respect. But then she started dating Travis Kelce, and the cameras on her at those games became their own fight.
This is where I had to stop us, because my ADD was going to run wild and we were live.
Nobody in That Room Cares That You’re Taylor Swift
What I feel like Taylor Swift did was break down the barrier between the cinematic experience and concerts, the distribution, the exhibitors, all of that. She did all of it. What she doesn’t seem to understand is that she has now entered a different realm.
So yeah, she got invited to the Golden Globes. But nobody in that room cares that she’s Taylor Swift. Nobody. They’re all famous on their own merit, on their own level, in their own way. So for her to suddenly behave that way, you want to sit there and go, did you forget what room you’re in?
One of the pundits online was saying “read the room, Jo Koy.” And I’m like, no, no, no. That wasn’t his problem. Taylor Swift needed to read the room and recognize that the purpose of the Golden Globes is to have fun, to joke. It’s basically a roast.
My co-host took it further than I did. Her issue with the cut is, I’m sorry, you are in the spotlight at this moment and this is just how it has to be. Robert Downey Jr., Meryl Streep, John Krasinski, they all know it’s fun. They all lean into their own jokes. And if you can’t carry yourself like that, then honey, don’t sit at the table. Congratulations, you went into the movie theaters, but you are not so important that you get to have that kind of attitude toward the movie and television industry.
Legit. And one of you in the live chat put it better than either of us: “Nothing’s more awkward than agreeing to be roasted only to get surly about it afterwards.” Thank you, sir, very much. 100% agreed.
What Barbie’s Cinematic Achievement Award Actually Means
A lot of different awards happened, and believe me, there are plenty of people out there who’ve covered all of them. By all means look them up and watch them. There were tons of great speeches. I loved Robert Downey Jr.’s speech, I loved Cillian Murphy’s speech, I thought all of them were brilliant.
But Barbie won the first Cinematic Achievement award, or whatever they’re calling it, and at first people were very much pooh-poohing it. Who knows what it means, who cares what it means, it could be anything.
You have to remember what it took. When Barbie wins the Cinematic Achievement award, it’s Barbenheimer. It’s the billion dollar mark. It’s the whole confluence of things that happened in order for that movie to be what it was. That’s the concept.
My co-host had the question I hadn’t put together yet, which is whether Taylor Swift was in that group too. She was. That’s the only reason she was even there. Which made sense to my co-host as the reason she was so bitter, and she didn’t mean that in a bad way.
She came around on the award itself, too. Both of them were very good in the movie theater, in the money and in the way it looked. People were wearing pink to the theater to see Barbie, and people were dressing up like they were going to a concert to see Taylor. She thinks it’s actually a good category. She just hopes it doesn’t become one of those things that has to be so pinpointed and perfect, the way some award shows get.
Culture Defines Cinema
One of the things I liked that Margot Robbie said was that it’s an award for the fans. Now, people might argue that’s what the MTV Awards are for, or the People’s Choice Awards, and blah blah blah.
At the end of the day I believe the issue is Hollywood itself. As an institution it hasn’t taken enough time to actually say, okay, we’re going to support movies that are big budget. They try to act like those are just the big budget cartoony whatever. And the truth is, no, dude, this is part of movies. That’s the reason you’ve got Martin Scorsese talking trash about what’s cinema and what isn’t.
Look, these movies exist. They’re here, they’re part of the culture, and culture is what defines cinema. Trust me, I say that as a filmmaker myself. We’ve made pilots and all of that.
So my big thing is, it’s a good Cinematic Achievement award, and I think it needs to be reflected as such.
There you go, now you know, and if knowing is half the battle you’re halfway to being a know-it-all yourself.
Tell me what you thought about Barbie winning the Cinematic Achievement award, and what your thoughts are on Taylor Swift and her behavior. And of course tell us what you thought of Jo Koy, but please be polite. My poor man’s just been eviscerated as it is. The conversation lives in the comments on the video above.
