‘Wicked’ gets the box office award; Demi Moore gives a powerful best actress speech
By January 5, 2025 5:37pm
As the 2025 Golden Globes play out Sunday night, Emilia Pérez, Conclave and The Brutalist are all making their case for frontrunner status in this unruly award season.
Some two-thirds of the way into the show, Emilia has won three awards, while Conclave and Brutalist have won the top prizes of screenplay and director, respectively.
Emilia Pérez star Zoe Saldaña took the first prize of the night as she won in the supporting actress category. The actress was recognized for her turn as a lawyer who assists a drug kingpin transition in Jacques Audiard’s dramatic musical released by Netflix. Emilia Pérez hopes to win best film comedy or musical against fellow frontrunners Wicked and Anora and set it on a course for an Oscar best picture win in March. Netflix has never taken the Academy’s top prize.
“My heart is full of gratitude,” Saldaña said in her tearful speech, as she saluted the “strength, complexity and undeniable talent” of co-stars Selena Gomez and Karla Sofía Gascón as well as director Audiard, all of whom are nominated for Globes. It was Saldaña’s first Globes win on the occasion of her first nomination.
But Conclave took the momentum back a short time later when Peter Straughan beat Emilia for best screenplay, as Focus Features’ twist-heavy papal drama got a boost in its bid for best drama at the Globes and an ultimate Oscar prize.
And then Brutalist helmer Brady Corbet won best director, like screenplay also an exclusive award since the Globes do not break the category into drama and comedy/musical sections. The immigrant epic starring Adrien Brody came out of nowhere at the Venice Film Festival, where it bowled over audiences and critics and was bought by A24.
“A few short months ago [this movie] had the odds very much stacked against it,” Corbet said, in an emotional speech that also paid tribute to the director Jeff Baena, who died this weekend, and Baena’s widow Aubrey Plaza.
The awards race has been particularly wide open this film season, as movies as disparate as Wicked, Anora, Emilia Perez, Conclave, September 5 and The Brutalist have all been at the front of the pack at one time or another.
Emilia Perez took another prize as it won best original song for Camille’s thumping anthem “El Mal,” deployed as Saldana’s character calls out hypocrisy in fighting the drug trade. “Songs are butterflies and we need butterflies even if it’s to denounce corruption in the world,” Camille said from the podium. Original score honors went to Challengers and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’ nerve-jangling beats in the tennis-set suspense thriller.
And non-English-language honors also went to Emilia, in an award that, at least last year, did not overlap with the Oscars. In accepting the award, Audiard gave the most political speech of the night on behalf of feminism and trans rights, noting that the American audience will need “nerves of steel” in 2025, ahead of the new Donald Trump administration, which he did not specifically name.
Audiard also said that “if there were more sisters in the world it might be a better place,” paid homage to “a woman as powerful and passionate as Karla Sofía Gascón” and dedicated the win to trans people, urging them “to keep their heads held high and continue to fight.” The speech could introduce a political element into the race and galvanize Academy members who might be inclined to send a message to the incoming administration.
After failing to convert on a pair of acting nominations, Wicked won its first prize of the night when it took the Globes’ newish cinematic and box-office achievement award. The prize is somewhat of a mixed blessing though, at least judging by last year, when Barbie won the inaugural Globes award but then went on to win only one Oscar, for song.
In accepting this year’s prize, Wicked director Jon M. Chu noted “how important making movies like this is; at a time when cynicism and pessimism rule this planet we can still make art that is a radical act of optimism.”
A standout speech of the night came when Demi Moore notched her first ever Globes win, taking best actress in a comedy or musical for her turn as an aging celebrity who tries an unusual pharmaceutical gambit in The Substance.
“In these moments when we we don’t think we’re enough,” she said, “just know you will never be enough. But you can know the value of your worth if you just put down the measuring stick.”
Moore said a producer who 30 years ago told her she was a “popcorn actress” had done a number on her psychologically. “It corroded me over time,” she said. Only when the Substance script crossed her desk did she regain her confidence.
Soon after Sebastian Stan won best actor in a comedy or musical for his role in A Different Man, like Substance another black comedy with body-transformation elements. “Our ignoring and discomfort around disability and disfigurement has to end now,” he said, also citing his Trump origin story The Apprentice, which he has said many actors don’t want to talk about.
“These are tough subject matters, but these films are real and necessary and we can’t be afraid and look away,” he said.
Animated honors went to Flow, the dialogue-free feline-focused environmental parable with serious indie cred, directed by Gints Zilbalodis. The film came out of Latvia and bested far more capitalized productions from Pixar and Universal.
“Thank you for embracing our little cat film,” he said.
Supporting actor film honors went to Kieran Culkin for his role as a free-speaking drifter on a Holocaust-history tour in Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain released by Searchlight. Culkin is a heavy favorite for the Oscar, and the Globes win continued to augur well for him. It’s been a good 12 months for Culkin at the Globes; he’s now won two prizes after also picking up best actor in a drama a year ago for his role in Succession.
Culkin had previously been nominated four times at the Globes without winning, dating back to his turn in indie-film darling Igby Goes Down in the early 2000s. “The first-ever acknowledgement I got as an actor was a Golden Globes nomination when I was basically a kid,” he said, referencing that moment.
Elsewhere at the show, Jodie Foster won lead actor in a miniseries or movie for her role in HBO’s True Detective: Night Country, her fifth Globes win ever, while Colin Farrell won in the same category on the male side for his shapeshifting turn in The Penguin, also from HBO.
Netflix’s Shogun has also done well on the television side as stars Hiroyuki Sanada and Tadanobu Asano won for lead actor in a dramatic TV series and best supporting actor on television, respectively. “You don’t know me. I’m an actor from Japan. My name is Tadanobu Asano,” the latter effused in a jubilant speech.
Hacks star Jean Smart won for lead performance by an actress in a TV comedy or musical, continuing the momentum from her win for best actress in a comedy series at the Emmys in September. The Max show Sunday night also won best comedy, as it did at the Emmys. Baby Reindeer star Jessica Gunning landed best supporting actress for her turn in Netflix’s intense stalker drama after taking that prize at the Emmys as well; Richard Gaad’s show also won best best miniseries, movie or anthology series on Sunday night. And The Bear’s Jeremy Allen White made it a twofer, winning for lead actor in a comedy or musical TV series after his own Emmys win. (Here is a complete list of Globes winners so far.)
Host Nikki Glaser opened the show inside the Beverly Hilton with a monologue that, give or take a weird Harrison Ford moment, seemed to go over better than last year’s hastily arranged performance by comedian Jo Koy.
“I am not here to roast you tonight. How could I?” Glaser asked, noting how powerful everyone in the room was. “You could really do anything, except tell the country who to vote for.”
The monologue was somewhat Wicked-heavy. “We can’t talk about movies tonight without talking about Wicked,” she said, before taking a few pokes at the musical blockbuster. Glaser was nominated but did not win for best TV stand-up special; those honors went to Ali Wong.
The voting body for the Globes was retooled ahead of last year’s show, with more than 330 international journalists replacing the clubbier 85 or so voters from the defunct Hollywood Foreign Press Association. While the track record is thin, last year’s show proved a relatively strong predictor of the Oscars, with winners for best drama (Oppenheimer), lead actor in a drama (Cillian Murphy), lead actress in a comedy (Emma Stone), director (Christopher Nolan), screenplay (Anatomy of a Fall) and animated movie (The Boy and the Heron) all going on to win corresponding top prizes at the Oscars.
Golden Globes producer Dick Clark Productions is owned by Penske Media Eldridge, a joint venture between Penske Media Corporation and Eldridge that also owns The Hollywood Reporter.
More to come.