GOLDEN GLOBE WINNER JOSE FERRER HONOURED BY POSTAL SERVICE
Golden Globe winner José Ferrer, who died in 1992 aged 80, will be immortalized on a First-Class Forever Stamp in 2012 as the 14th luminary celebrated in the U.S. Postal Service’s Distinguished Americans series.
Considered one of the most accomplished talents of his generation, Ferrer won several Tony Awards for his work on stage and performed in more than 60 movies, garnering three Academy Award nominations. He won the Golden Globe in 1990n for Best Actor for his role as Cyrano de Bergerac.
“The Postal Service is proud to honor José Ferrer on a Forever Stamp,” said Stephen Kearney, manager, Stamp Services. “A renaissance man who spoke five languages fluently, Ferrer’s accomplishments extended to many areas of entertainment.”
The portrait featured on the stamp is an oil painting by Daniel Adel of Cold Spring, NY, based on a photograph of Ferrer. Adel worked under the direction of art director Antonio Alcalá of Alexandria, VA.
Read More »GLOBES HELP FUND CHARITY GIVING—Variety
Reprinted from Variety:
Awards aren’t goal of HFPA giving
Golden Globes Update
Mata
For the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn., the Golden Globes ceremony does double duty.After the celebration, a portion of the money earned by the HFPA from licensing the event is used fund the organization’s substantial charitable outreach, which reached a record $1,579,500 in 2011.
While the HFPA gives grants to dozens of organizations whose missions range from film preservation and restoration to education and training in the arts, the group is keenly focused on giving a diverse new crop of young filmmakers the tools and the chance to make their own movies.
“Whether children are living in the inner city of Los Angeles or in Darfur, I believe that giving them a chance to tell their stories through making their own films makes them focus on something positive,” says HFPA member Paz Mata. “Once you put a camera in the hands of these kids, you give them the possibility to do something good for themselves and their community.”
This year, the HFPA gave grants to the Ghetto Film School, Inner-City Arts, the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts Foundation and FilmAid Intl., which conducts screenings and filmmaker training in Kenyan refugee camps.
Whether these students find themselves at the bargaining table for some kind of distribution deal or whether they’re ever nominated for a prestigious award isn’t the yardstick for success, according to HFPA chairman Philip Berk.
“If you’re giving a grant to UCLA or Ghetto Film School, you’re not necessarily going to be able to point to a nomination of some kind or a film that gets into theaters as a measure of success of what you did,” Berk says. “What you did do with the money is you gave someone the chance to get started in filmmaking and finish a project that can become the stepping stone for them into the industry.”
Mata even hopes to expand the HFPA’s outreach to include children in more countries that have been saddled with financial and political woes. She is searching for more organizations that help kids living in troubled locales through the arts.
“We’ve been very fortunate that we haven’t had to cut back our giving because of the success of the Golden Globes,” Mata says. “It’s really our purpose to use this money in a positive way.”
SMILEY’S PEOPLE ‘IN THE WORKS’
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy star Gary Oldman, mingling with HFPA members and other guests at a reception at Soho House, revealed that a sequel to the spy thriller could be in the works. Oldman, who star as George Smiley, said that the idea of merging Smiley’s People with The Honorable Schoolboy to make one movie has already been discussed, author John Le Carre approves and the director Tomas Alfredson is willing to return.
Oldman, known to Harry Potter fans as Sirius Black, is, he says, currently an unemployed actor. “I have nothing lined up and nothing in the works and I’m very happy to be enjoying my free time,” he says.
Read More »Golden Globes: Most Memorable Moments
The Hollywood Reporter has done some research and published some of the Golden Globes’ most memorable moments—and there have been plenty of them. Here is just a small selection.
GLOBES TRIAL DATE SET
The trial over the rights to the Golden Globe telecast has been set for January 24, a little more than a week after the 2012 Golden Globe awards.
The HFPA claims that Dick Clark Productions signed a long-term agreement with NBC without its consent. DCP claims that none is needed under the terms of its contract with the organisation.
The non-jury trial, which is expected to last about two weeks, was due to begin in September but was postponed after the original judge withdrew for health reasons. To streamline the process Judge Howard Matz will allow each side to present their witness’s testimony in writing but still be cross-examined.
Read More »GLOBES ‘CHALLENGING STRUGGLING OSCARS’ SAYS NY POST
From the New York Post
Watch your back, Oscar!
The Academy Awards telecast — plagued in recent years by low ratings and growing viewer discontent — is in danger of playing second fiddle to the younger, hipper Golden Globes, experts say.
“The Globes have seized the cool factor this year,” Tom O’Neil, editor of GoldDerby.com, tells The Post.
The Oscars telecast, meanwhile, “is like high mass,” he says. “And going to church is supposed to be boring. It is part of the punishment for the soul that you deserve for living that glamorous Hollywood life.”
Ratings for “Hollywood’s Biggest Night” have been flirting with all-time lows, with just more than 36 million tuning in last February.
A BIT STIFF: When the Oscars tried to cater to a young audience with James Franco and Anne Hathaway as hosts, they still didn’t measure up to the much edgier Golden Globes (hosted last year and again this year by Ricky Gervais) or the MTV Movie Awards.
“I think someday it is inevitable that the MTV Movie Awards will surpass the Oscars in terms of eyeballs [watching],” O’Neil says.
Much of the anticipation about this year’s Golden Globes comes from returning host Ricky Gervais.
“He was such a skunk at the picnic last year that everyone is looking forward to what mischief he perpetrates this year,” O’Neil says.
“There is a lot of buzz and excitement surrounding the Globes that are not surrounding the Oscars.”
The 2012 Academy Awards — which air Feb. 26 — have instead been trying to deflect attention away from the recent loss of producer Brett Ratner and host Eddie Murphy.
Comedian Billy Crystal — who has emceed the event eight times between 1990 and 2004 — came to the show’s rescue in November.
But at 63, is he simply too old to recapture Oscar’s former glory — and the 40 million-plus who once tuned in?
“Billy Crystal was the perfect guy at the perfect cultural moment,” says TV expert Bob Thompson at Syracuse University.
“But he is a lot older now. This moment is very, very different. One of my students actually said to me, ‘Isn’t Billy Crystal dead?’ ”
O’Neil believes Oscar producers should simply give up trying to pander to the Twitter generation.
“I think they are realizing the error of their recent ways when they hankered after hipness by picking Anne Hathaway and James Franco last year and seeing that become a disaster,” he says.
“And by picking the rent-a-clowns from New York — Jon Stewart, Chris Rock and David Letterman — who were totally inappropriate hosts for the Oscars, they were trying to be totally cool and edgy and it backfired.
“Now they are going with a Hollywood insider who is a proven maestro.”
Gervais, meanwhile, has vowed nothing is off limits for his Globes return on January 15.
“Or I wouldn’t do it,” he tells The BBC. “Where is the fun in that? Get someone who can read [cue cards], because I am not very good at that.”
Last year, Gervais came under fire for attacking Charlie Sheen, Scientology and even the president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
“The greatest thing about him is . . . you don’t know what he is going to do,” Globes producer Barry Adelman tells The Post.
“Of course it scares you, but at the end of the day it keeps you on your toes, which is good for everybody.
“Our approach is we want to throw a big party to celebrate the best of the year in movies and television, and we want people to have a great time when they are at that party. I think that spills over into the television viewing audience.”
Read More »HPFA PRESIDENT TALKS TO BUSAN CULTURE SOCIETY
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During a recent visit to Busan, HFPA President Dr. Aida Takla-O’Reilly was interviewed by the Culture M Media Society. He Q: Who runs the HFPA? Dr. Aida: A president, vice-president, executive secretary, treasurer and board of directors are elected from among the members each year. The general membership meets monthly and has the final say on all decisions. The HFPA also has four full-time employees, who are not members. CultureM: How is the HFPA funded? Dr. Aida: The HFPA receives substantial licensing fees for the network broadcasting rights to the Golden Globe Awards and from associated activities such as Golden Globe Awards pre-shows. CultureM: Apart from running the Association, how is this money used? Dr. Aida: The HFPA has an annual grants program that distributes sums among various entertainment-related non-profits and to entertainment-related scholarships at major educational institutions. In 2010, the HFPA gave grants totaling a record $1,541,000, bringing their overall donations to more than $12 million. Each year HFPA members interview more than 400 actors, directors, writers and producers, as well as reporting from film sets and seeing more than 300 films. Members also attend film festivals in other countries in order to seek out interesting and innovative foreign language films and establish cultural bonds with directors, actors, jurors and fellow journalists around the world. Membership meetings are held monthly and the officers and directors are elected annually. A maximum of five journalists are admitted to the organization each year. All members are accredited by the Motion Picture Association of America. As the international box office has dramatically expanded in recent years, so the Globes’ prestige has increased. The awards now have the distinction of being one of the three most-watched award shows on television.
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A BIG ‘THANK YOU’ FROM THE SHUTTERBUGS
In a letter to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association Catherine Berclaz writes:
“I wanted to send you a quick update on Pablove Shutterbugs Photography Program along with some photos from our LA and NY classes. This year with the help of your $5,000 grant we had 42 students graduate from our photography program for pediatric cancer patients. Our students are patients from CHLA, Cedars-Sinai and NYU Langone Medical Center. Each child received a camera kit which was theirs to keep and also completed our 8 week course.
The program was a huge success and we have received interest from many of our students to continue learning about photography. We already have patients on our waiting list in New York and Los Angeles to attend our 2012 Pablove Shutterbugs Program because of the success of the program. We will be expanding our program to more than double our students in 2012 in both cities.
I want to thank you for your support of Pablove Shutterbugs and enabling us to teach these eager students to develop their creative voice through the art of photography.”
Read More »WOODY WANTS TO COME HOME
A
fter a decade making movies in London, Paris and Rome, Woody Allen is ready to come home.
The Golden Globe-winning filmmaker told members of the Hollywood Foreign Press at an informal reception in New York that his next movie will be in the USA.
He did not see a two-part documentary on his life which was screened by PBS over two nights because, he said, he preferred to watch a football game one night and he was playing his clarinet at the Carlyle Hotel the next.
The 75-year-old Allen has been nominated for a Golden Globe 11 times and won for his screenplay for Purple Rose of Cairo.
Read More »
HFPA RULE BOOSTS FOREIGN FILMS—-Variety
Variety’s Peter Debruge writes:
“We consider this category very important because it gives us the feeling that we are international journalists,” says Serge Rakhlin, chairman of the Globes’ foreign language category, pointing out the org’s members travel to many festivals over the course of the year.
Whereas the Academy adheres to a decades-old system in which a committee from each country picks one film to compete, the HFPA will consider any overseas pic submitted and screened for the org, provided it opened abroad within the prior 14 months.
“Unlike the Academy, we don’t accept just one per country,” Rakhlin says. “By our rules, they can submit as many as they want. There’s no limit.”
That’s important for countries such has France, Italy and Spain, which produce many quality features each year. The Academy forces them to choose. “Remember, the Oscar goes to the country, not the filmmaker,” says Mark Johnson, chair of the Acad’s foreign-language film exec committee. That is seldom easy for a country like Belgium, uniquely divided between two language factions — French and Flemish.
Belgium’s committee raised eyebrows this year after picking “Bullhead,” the winner of six Flanders Film Awards, over French-language Cannes grand jury winner “The Kid With a Bike,” directed by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.
“The Dardenne brothers are like icons,” says “Bullhead” helmer Michael R. Roskam, who fully expected the crowd-pleasing “Kid” to get Belgium’s bid over his film, a thriller inspired by murder and corruption perpetrated by the country’s “hormone mafia” in the ’90s.
“It’s an honor, not only to be the representative of your country, but to have such a strong film as your competitor,” says Roskam, whose pic won the audience prize at AFI earlier this month.
Roskam wasn’t the only one surprised by Belgium’s choice. The committee had previously submitted three Dardenne pics — “Rosetta,” “The Son” and “The Child,” none of which was nommed — and many consider “Kid,” which features a genuine movie star in Cecile de France, to be the Dardennes’ most optimistic and Oscar-friendly film yet.
“We believe there are people who really did not want it to be our film,” confides Luc Dardenne. “We could say that our quasi-celebrity status in other countries made certain people jealous, and it can probably be pinned down to that.”
Whereas the HFPA will consider both “Bullhead” and “Kid” for its foreign-language prize, the Academy is at the mercy of such political maneuvers in other countries. Another 2011 scandal involves Russia’s choice of “The Citadel,” Nikita Mikhalkov’s critically panned follow-up to his Oscar-winning 1994 pic “Burnt by the Sun,” for Acad consideration. Passed over were such celebrated alternatives as “Elena” (from “The Return” director Andrei Zvyagintsev) and Aleksandr Sokurov’s “Faust” (which won the Golden Lion at Venice).
“Being from Russia originally, I can tell you there are people who say there are better films to represent the country,” says Rakhlin, pointing out that the only Russian pic up for Globes contention this year is “Elena.” “I’m glad we have this film because it was not submitted for Oscar.”
The HFPA’s approach is also better suited to accommodate international co-productions.
“I sort of refer to it as ‘The Motorcycle Diaries’ problem,” Johnson says. “We were taken to task for not having nominated the movie, but it was never submitted. For whatever reason, no country would claim it, probably because it was such an international film.” The film did receive two other noms, original song and adapted screenplay, winning the former.
How is that possible? With the Oscars, foreign language is the only feature category in which films do not need a one-week qualifying run on Los Angeles screens to be eligible, though doing so technically allows them to compete in other categories.
That happened in 2002, when Spain selected “Mondays in the Sun” over Pedro Almodovar’s “Talk to Her,” which went on to win a screenwriting Oscar. Spain has taken criticism this year for choosing Agusti Villaronga’s “Black Bread” instead of Almodovar’s “The Skin I Live in.”
Such decisions are inevitably painful and potentially controversial. Films can slip through the cracks with the Globes as well, though Rakhlin and other members often go out of their way to encourage producers of quality foreign pics to submit — the more the merrier.
“Theoretically, if two masterpieces come from the same country, why not consider them both?” he says.
GOLDEN GLOBES PREVIEW IN DAILY VARIETY
Ricky didn’t lose their number | Peace for a time as org and prodco collaborate | No-limit rule a boon for global pic parade | HFPA denies being starstruck in noms process | Marketing strategies can shift at Globes time | No rest for the bleary-eyed | New kids on the blockContact Peter Debruge at peter.debruge@variety.com
