Like most reckonings, the downfall of the Golden Globe Awards was a long time coming, even if it appeared to happen suddenly.

The Globes has always been hyped as “Hollywood’s favorite party,” a boozy free-for-all prologue to the Oscars where viewers could join the tables of the biggest stars in the world by way of NBC’s massively successful telecast. Then on Monday came a staggering rebuke—NBC announced it would not broadcast next year’s ceremony following a cascade of diversity failures, racism allegations, professionalism complaints, and public embarrassments surrounding the group that votes on the awards, the 86-member Hollywood Foreign Press Association. 

The HFPA had survived criticisms and doubts about its legitimacy before. But this time, the actors themselves led the attack—vowing to boycott the Globes over what they considered to be lackluster plans for reform and improvement. That made NBC’s choice obvious, according to a source familiar with the network’s decision: “The talent wasn’t going to participate. There’s no show if there’s no talent.”

A series of Vanity Fair interviews with high-level publicists, awards consultants, and various network and studio executives revealed how decades of pent-up anger and discomfort have compounded the woes of the Golden Globes, leading to even broader calls for restructuring and changes to toxic behavior within the group before it starts handing out trophies again.

The awards ceremony itself may have been billed as a playful and laid-back affair. But the gauntlet of glad-handing and servility that talent felt they had to undertake to get recognition from the voters created enduring resentment toward the HFPA, according to several talent representatives and awards consultants. The complaints started with a lack of Black voters in the group, but now it includes allegations of other troubling behavior.

On Saturday, Scarlett Johansson released a statement calling for actors to “step back” from the Golden Globes, saying that over the years she had faced “sexist questions and remarks by certain HFPA members that bordered on sexual harassment.”

In addition to verbal remarks, HFPA members have also allegedly gotten physically inappropriate with actors. (Brendan Fraser has said that he was groped in 2003 by Philip Berk, a former president of the group; Berk denied this, telling GQ that he pinched Fraser as a joke.) One executive who has dealt extensively with the HFPA told Vanity Fair: “Through the years, there were things like, ‘Can you read this script?’ Or an inappropriate comment. Those kind of things, people just kinda put up with.” But not anymore.

The HFPA was partially shielded from consequence because it had the power to add momentum to an Academy Awards run, or to trip up a campaign. No one wanted to cross them. Now, their power is diminished—and some reps don’t just want the HFPA to diversify by adding new members, but also expect them to remove members who have acted poorly or don’t currently work for legitimate overseas outlets.

“This is decades of bad behavior,” said one publicist with a roster of A-listers and Oscar winners. “Most people want the show to continue. One thing that has been misunderstood is ‘the publicists are ganging up on the Golden Globes.’ We don’t want them to be canceled; we want them to remake. We want the Golden Globes, but we want them to be with real journalists who actually write for publications and don’t insult and degrade our clients.”

Controversy has long mired the Globes and the HFPA, whose members have been mocked repeatedly by hosts of their own show for having trashy taste and dubious credibility. Their press conferences are renowned for awkward questions that spark arguments with each other. They sometimes come off more like pushy fans than journalists, asking for photos and autographs and uncomfortable favors.

A top talent rep describes how publicists prepare clients who are new to the HFPA: “This is what we tell all of them: ‘You won’t believe this, but the Golden Globes are decided by, like, 80 weirdos. They’re going to fight with each other and say weird things. Just pretend they’re a crazy aunt or uncle. Patronize them, and don’t worry—none of these interviews get seen anyway.’”

Many other publicists echoed similar remarks. They all say they are tired of giving that awkward speech to their actors and filmmakers. Their goal in speaking out now is to force the Globes organization to become more respectable. To them this is an intervention.

This year, a series of new bombshells hit the Globes, and each seemed to set off another. One week before the most recent Globes ceremony, another Los Angeles Times article reported that the HFPA did not have a single Black member. The group's leadership vowed to make changes, but with the public's emotions still raw over the murder of George Floyd, the police shooting of Breonna Taylor, and the summer's #BlackLivesMatter uprisings, such promises were met with skepticism at best.

Then it got worse. At the Oscars, HFPA member Margaret Gardiner asked supporting actor winner Daniel Kaluuya what it was like to work with director Regina King. Kaluuya, who looked taken aback, asked her to repeat the question. (His movie, Judas and the Black Messiah, was directed by Shaka King, while Regina King directed fellow supporting actor nominee Leslie Odom Jr. in One Night in Miami.) Gardiner insisted she didn't confuse the actors, but the HFPA's lack of any Black members made it especially cringeworthy that one of them had seemingly confused Black performers and directors.

Then, it got worse again. Much worse. The Los Angeles Times reported that Berk, the former HFPA president Brendan Fraser accused of groping, sent an email to other members of the HFPA denouncing #BlackLivesMatter as a “racist hate movement,” among other apparently disparaging remarks. The article quoted replies from fellow HFPA members Luca Celada, Noemia Young, and Rui Coimbra angrily denouncing him; the group revoked Berk’s membership over the incident. But the wound was reopened just weeks before the HFPA voted on its proposed reforms.

Meanwhile, actors and their P.R. representatives were bracing for a fight against an organization they saw as troubled in many regards. “Not having Black people in the group, that’s part of it, and indicative of an antiquated group,” said the A-list publicist involved in the movement.

Another high-level publicist told Vanity Fair that this exclusion was reflected in how the HFPA voted, leading them only to consider Black artists who were already superstars. “They just weren't implementing change in a way that seemed swift or sincere. They do give awards to people of color, and yet there are so many people of color that they ignore and don’t give the time of day to, and don’t even screen their movies,” the publicist said.

Jackie Bazan-Ross, whose PR firm specializes in highlighting the work of African-American artists, described daylong press conference events with the HFPA in which members would leave the sessions when Black actors and filmmakers were scheduled to do Q&As for their projects. “They'll fly around the globe for Angry Birds, but they walked out on The Hate U Give, which was a film so socially relevant at the time—and still," she told Vanity Fair.

Other publicists described similar incidents, noting that the Globes voters would then backtrack and express interest when one of the projects with Black talent broke big, like Netflix's Bridgerton. Otherwise, they were notoriously dismissive.

Others in the industry note that the HFPA sometimes alienated publicists by asking abrasive or, some would argue, direct questions in their press events, and that this movement against the Globes is at least in part aimed at taming that. “Publicists have been trying to find a way to stop doing interviews with the HFPA for the longest time,” said one senior awards consultant. 

While some journalists in the group have strong reputations, the HFPA acted to protect even those who didn’t. The consultant said they had a pact that meant no member could be excluded from press conferences and events. “It was ‘Take all of us or none of us,’” the consultant said. If you didn’t, the risk was being left out of the awards.

Now, the actors are the ones unifying against the HFPA.

On Friday, May 7, the Globes group ratified its plan for systemic change, aimed at diversifying its membership in response to the Los Angeles Times reports. The Time’s Up Foundation immediately shrugged off the plans as “window-dressing platitudes” that it found to be “sorely lacking and hardly transformational. Instead, these proposed measures ensure that the current membership of the HFPA will remain in the majority for years to come."

That evening, Shannon Barr of the agency Strategic Public Relations blasted an email to the coalition of publicists who had taken a stand against the Globes group. “We want to keep this train moving and we think it’s time to finally bring in the BIG GUNS…. OUR CLIENTS!” she wrote. “We are asking all the publicists on this chain to ask their clients to post about the HFPA’s poor response to reform by posting the #CHANGEisGOLDEN…. We are also asking them, if they are comfortable to post their feelings about the situation and stand with us, to call on REAL SIGNIFIGANT [sic] REFORM or not see any of their faces at the 2022 GG [Golden Globes].” 

When asked how her message was received, Barr told Vanity Fair: “Everything has been supportive. No pushback from anyone.”

On Thursday, Netflix co-CEO and chief content officer Ted Sarandos told the HFPA that the streaming powerhouse would not engage with the Globes during the next awards season, a crushing dismissal given Netflix’s well-known awards competitiveness. Jennifer Salke, head of Amazon Studios, did the same.

Then Johansson released her blistering statement. Mark Ruffalo, who won at the February ceremony for I Know This Much Is True, tweeted despairingly: “Now is the time to step up and right the wrongs of the past. Honestly, as a recent winner of a Golden Globe, I cannot feel proud or happy about being a recipient of this award.” Tom Cruise, who won Globes for 1990’s Born on the Fourth of July, 1997's Jerry Maguire, and 2000's Magnolia, announced he would return his three trophies. 

WarnerMedia sent a letter to the HFPA saying it also would not participate in the Globes again until significant reforms were made, removing Warner Bros., HBO Max, and TNT from the equation. In addition to demanding that the Globes enact stronger measures for “diversity, equity and inclusion,” WarnerMedia’s statement suggested that the group has harbored prejudice against Black artists. “We are keenly aware of how much harder we’ve had to lobby to secure press conferences for a number of Black performers and creators, representing unquestionably worthy content,” the letter stated.

Then WarnerMedia addressed the broader issues of the group’s behavior, calling for zero tolerance for unwanted touching. “In addition, our teams have endured press conferences where our talent were asked racially insensitive, sexist and homophobic questions. For far too long, demands for perks, special favors and unprofessional requests have been made to our teams and to others across the industry. We regret that as an industry, we have complained, but largely tolerated this behavior until now.”

Not long after that statement hit Monday morning, NBC announced it was canceling the next Golden Globes broadcast.

That doesn’t mean the Globes are gone for good. “We continue to believe that the HFPA is committed to meaningful reform,” NBC said in its statement. “However, change of this magnitude takes time and work, and we feel strongly that the HFPA needs time to do it right.” The network said that after more changes are made, it would be open to evaluating whether to broadcast the show again in January 2023.

A source with knowledge of the network’s decision said it was the only reasonable choice. “It still has to be appropriate. You'd like it to come back, because it’s a big part of the town. But you 100% have to make sure they do the reform first.”

The HFPA released this statement when asked for comment about NBC not airing the show: “Regardless of the next air date of the Golden Globes, implementing transformational changes as quickly—and as thoughtfully—as possible remains the top priority for our organization. We invite our partners in the industry to the table to work with us on the systemic reform that is long overdue, both in our organization as well as within the industry at large.”

The loss of the show will come at a high cost for many people outside the HFPA as well. Awards strategists whose entire jobs involved analyzing and courting Globes voters may be laid off or see their fees drastically reduced. There will be no “for your consideration” Golden Globe ad buys, which will hurt trade publications and entertainment magazines. Los Angeles restaurants and hotels already reeling from the quarantine lockdown will have fewer events to host. 

“There are going to be millions and millions of dollars lost,” said the awards consultant. “The dominos are going to begin to fall. Everyone is going to suffer financially from this.”

The question now is whether a critics award event or a guild ceremony can step into the void. Many industry insiders doubt it. The Globes were popular because they were accessible. They focused on celebrities rather than behind-the-scenes artists, not even having separate categories for adapted and original screenplays. They also included both TV and movies.

The Screen Actors Guild Awards ceremony comes closest to matching what the Globes did—but it doesn’t include prizes for anyone except for actors, leaving out directors, writers, composers, and best picture categories.  

If the HFPA doesn't win back the trust of “The Town,” it may be that nothing replaces it. We are, after all, in the age of getting used to being without.

“This may not have happened in any year other than the COVID year,” the awards consultant said. “Everybody got used to not going to events, doing interviews, and forgot it was the only fun show to attend. There’s a lot of reflection that ‘life is too short, do I want to play the game anymore?’ A lot of the benefits were missed this year altogether.”

And if no one misses the Globes, that may be the thing that ends them completely.

Additional reporting by Joy Press

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