A boycott by nominees and presenters has forced the cancellation
of the planned Golden Globe Awards ceremony, with organizers
planning instead to announce the award winners during an hour-long
news conference, organizers announced Monday.
"We are all very disappointed that our traditional awards
ceremony will not take place this year and that millions of viewers
worldwide will be deprived of seeing many of their favorite stars
celebrating 2007's outstanding achievements in motion pictures and
television," said Jorge Camara, president of the Hollywood Foreign
Press Association.
"We take some comfort in knowing that this year's Golden Globe
Award recipients will be announced on the date originally
scheduled," he said.
The cancellation makes the Golden Globes the first major
awards-show casualty of the Hollywood writers' strike, which began
Nov. 5 over a dispute focusing on residual payments to writers for
work distributed via the Internet, iPods, cell phones and other new
media.
Screen Actors Guild announced last week that its members
appeared to be in "unanimous agreement" that they would not cross
the writers' picket line to attend the Golden Globes ceremony,
either as award nominees or presenters.
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association did not immediately
provide additional details about Sunday's announcement scheduled
for 6 p.m. at the Beverly Hilton and broadcast live by NBC
News.
A red-carpet-type event would be held immediately after the
announcement, with winners being given the chance to visit a
pressroom for photos and interviews, according to local LA
Weekly.
The writers' strike had already forced the cancellation of the
People's Choice Awards ceremony, which was scheduled for Tuesday
night at Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. Organizers canceled the
red-carpet ceremony, and will instead announce the award winners
through a recorded two-hour special television program.
(Xinhua News Agency January 8, 2008)
