(by Madan Mohan)
Going to lead this with what may seem like a non-sequitur. In 1979, heavy metal band Judas Priest released a live album (that is, pulled from a concert) called Unleashed In The East. It’s one of the most coveted releases of the band with the live versions in some cases surpassing those of the studios. It is also an album where ace vocalist Rob Halford’s vocals were heavily overdubbed separately in the studio because, erm, the ‘real’ live ones weren’t up to ‘expectations’. Those in the know sneeringly refer to the album as Unleashed In The Studio while still spinning it one more time. So much for rock and roll authenticity!
In a similar vein, RIcky Gervais went viral on social media with his Golden Globe monologue (he was hosting it, for the fifth time) as well as other asides delivered during the awards show. Gervais’ Golden Globe emcee turns have always been a riot but this one was notable for its political tone in exceedingly political times. It was also notable for punching back at the (neo)liberal darlings like Hollywood and FAANG (Facebook-Apple-Amazon-Netflix-Google) rather than, well, Trump, Trump and Trump. It was applauded by the plebs, gleefully welcomed by conservatives with no introspection directed towards the follies of their own ilk and pooh-poohed by liberal news outlets. Entirely predictable set of reactions, in other words. So about now is a good time to add that Gervais was, for the most part, reading this brilliant monologue from a teleprompter as all emcees do.
That is, the Hollywood Foreign Press (themselves at the receiving end of his monologue) knew what he was going to say and let him have at it. They even mocked him back a little, saying, “RIcky, just give it to us in writing that this is the last time.” MAYBE some of the esteemed guests for the occasion were genuinely caught off guard by the sharp jibes Gervais was firing. Well, that sounds like the technique Ram Madhvani used for Neerja; he never told the actors acting as the audience exactly when the hijackers would fire, so that their reactions of terror would be more authentic. Within the boundaries of what was, ultimately, a film, a fictional depiction of real events. So too, perhaps, the Globes left the who’s who of Hollywood gasping in seemingly genuine horror as Gervais took digs at both Epstein and Weinstein, reminding them that the former was their friend and that they had worked a lot with the latter.
Gervais himself winked at the grand act he was staging – the ultimate charade of authenticity. He mentioned that he too had come in a limo and proceeded to turn it into a gig at Felicity Huffman. The shocked gasps at the latter barb shrouded the sly first part of the statement. Gervais is simultaneously assuring his flesh-and-blood audience (as opposed to those of us watching on TV or Youtube) that he is, after all, one of them but also mocking them from his bully pulpit of comedian emcee, flaunting the ephemeral privilege he has for these few hours over the otherwise far more illustrious and moneyed Hollywood aristocracy in attendance at the gig.
Yes, Gervais was telling them that the season demanded such barbs even if they were, momentarily, painful to deal with. He reminded (and assured) them that these are just jokes. The jokes deliver temporary solace to the plebs, who derive pleasure from seeing Hollywood squirm. But on the morrow, Hollywood carries on making supposedly crappy, theme park movies that nevertheless rake in the millions because we somehow make our way to theaters in enough numbers when we could be binge-watching Afterlife. Likewise, this purportedly boring as hell award show broke the internet and is still the talk of town (with yours truly herewith adding to the chatter) because Hollywood will let Gervais have digs at their expense. They are actors; they know the routine. Heck, they can even feign disgust far better than we can vent genuine expression of it.
TL DR: The monologue is but yet another act (and an exceedingly clever one) in the great play of showbiz, capturing brilliantly the zeitgeist of the times. Reality TV 2.0.
Baradwaj Rangan 
MANK
January 10, 2020
Superb Madan Bhai. You nailed it. After a long time, I enjoyed watching a Hollywood awards show. I hav not seen either globes and Oscars for a while, as both the quality of the movies and the show has been pathetic. This time there were some of my favorite movies, actors and filmmakers in the running; like Scorsese and Tarantino, Pacino and Pitt; with Pitt winning a richly deserved award, though it should have been as a lead actor, not supporting. And gervais turned in a good show. My main grouse was that Tarantino didn’t win best director. He deserved it more than anybody else.
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Anu Warrier
January 10, 2020
Madan, succinctly captured. It’s never an impromptu act, even if some people would like to think so.
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Kay
January 10, 2020
Excellent article Madan.
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Larry huff
January 11, 2020
It may have been upsetting to his audience but for me, an old tired man that hears the liberal TV pundits daily bullshit it was very refreshing. I never heard Trump, impeachment or I mentioned once. I for one despise the golden globe crowd. Arrogant self serving pompous condescending useless excuses for humans. Looking at their facial expressions as they were called out for what they truly are was marvelous reality TV for me and best of all I didn’t need to watch the show, got it all on you tube.
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guhanasp
January 11, 2020
Lol what? I know Hollywood will do things like this to make them look ‘self-evaluated’ so they can be even more relatable to all sides(the same Hollywood fraternity which once boo’ed a native Indian who spoken in behalf of Marlon Brando in Oscar awards ceremony to stay relatable)
But it is universally known that Ricky Gervais is a grifter and stale ‘attack helicopter’ type jokes on trans people is his main staple. He might be a good comedian but his jokes are pathetically old. I don’t know why these liberal conservatives of West are so triggered by some celebrities expressing their political opinions on a widely popular awards show. It is not like you are stripped away if entertainment or anything, it’s just real people with real faces using the stage to show their dissent. Remember peeps, art is political and artists can have political opinions too.
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Ed Martinez
January 11, 2020
Regardless whether he was being genuine or not he said the same things conservatives have been saying about liberal Hollywood for years. Some might’ve not being as bothered as others but the notion that nobody was bothered is not smart analysis. Why would any celebrity want gervasis to remind the entire world that they were friends with the two most hated proven rapists of women and children? Especially after many women who once worked in Hollywood accused those very celebrities of being implicated and guilty of shutting their eyes and ignoring their behavior. Staying silent to protect their friend. You can clearly see by the expressions on many of their faces that they were not happy that he reminded the world of that silence while at the same time yelling sexist or misogyny when law makers including the president were running for office. It’s the hypocrisy that he exposed
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Madan
January 11, 2020
Thanks MANK, Anu Warrier, Kay.
guhanasp: You seem to have got the impression somehow that I didn’t enjoy the monologue or the digs at Hollywood elite. On the contrary, I did, immensely. This is more about the reaction to the monologue than the monologue itself and also the self-referencing element within Gervais’ digs.
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Madan
January 11, 2020
guhanasp: Check that, I see that your principal objection is in fact to what Gervais said and that conservatives are celebrating it. Well, it wouldn’t make the Weinstein or Epstein digs ring less true, unfortunately for Hollywood. When you talk about opposing sexual harassment or pedophilia and ignore the two biggest elephants in the room for the longest time, you are kind of asking for it (to get called hypocrites, that is).
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Enigma
January 11, 2020
Very nicely written Madan. Loved Gervais’ monologue. He hit the nail on the head when he said that celebrities are in position to lecture others. And I loved it that he managed to take a pop at Greta Thurnberg too.
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Dawn
January 11, 2020
His monologue was priceless! I watch it over and over….love the reaction of the self absorbed Hollywood elitist…..
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guhan
January 11, 2020
@Madan I agree that Gervais dug the hypocrisy hidden in hollywood~Fine. But my argument is,his senseless dig at artists who express their political opinions. Yeah, hollywood is hypocrite if it opposes sexual harassment while ignoring the weinsteins; so is when they criticize capitalism while themselves being absolved by Disney’s tentacles. His dig reeks like ,” You are criticizing society, yet you live in one. Curious”. Hollywood needs to be accountable of said things, but they are not absolute models for moral conduct.
His monologue is very self-referential; by saying everyone to be apolitical in his/her speech, he supports status quo, which is conservative’s idealogue.That makes him the biggest hypocrite!
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Kat Harper
January 11, 2020
Whether bullshit, horseshit or just plain old non-partisan shit, the stench is still the same. As for whether Ricky Gervais’ remarks were 100% spontaneous and unrehearsed, or he intoned them in front of a mirror 20 times a day for 6 months prior to the Golden Globes is irrelevant. They were so enthusiastically welcomed because they expressed the weariness those of us NOT infected by TDS to a maniacal degree feel everytime we watch a morning show, or an afternoon program, or the evening news, only to be psychologically hijacked by some actor, long-forgotten celebrity or brain-injured athlete whose only claim to relevancy is the fact that, with few variations, they can trumpet the same crap we heard 3 programs ago: banging that old “Orange Man BAD, BAD, BAD!” drum. Or bestowing near-godlike status upon an irritating, obnoxious 17 year-old Swedish high school dropout, whom I am MORE than OVER. One doesn’t have to be a member of MENSA to be cynically aware they are being played like a worn-out Stradivarius by every opinionated, rage-or-politics-fuelled wingnut scrambling frantically for the 15 minutes Warhol prophesied so long ago. LUCKY bastard, not to have lived to see mind-numbing Political Correctness, Plague Rat numbers of undocumented aliens, and instant celebrity status conferred upon people whose only apparent relevancy is the fact they have a mouth, and seemingly limitless energy to run it.
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Madan
January 12, 2020
“His monologue is very self-referential” – Duh, I happened to have mentioned that myself in my article. Maybe read it one more time to understand what my position is. I am not going to get into your specific objections until then. I have simultaneously covered the reasons why his monologue was much appreciated by the vox populi (and much to the chagrin of liberal media) while also pointing out the limitations of the charade.
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Madan
January 12, 2020
“Why would any celebrity want gervasis to remind the entire world that they were friends with the two most hated proven rapists of women and children?” – They don’t want it but they are certainly smart enough to know Gervais’ rants will at the most get people talking about it for a few days. Weinstein is on trial and Epstein is dead. End of the story. Also, there is a difference between some individual actors or film personalities feeling bothered because they didn’t know what Gervais was going to say (as I mentioned in the write up) and the Hollywood Foreign Press itself being caught unawares. The latter is highly improbable. So they saw the content and judged it to be ok. Controversial, maybe, which would help them get eyeballs. They’re saying, “OK, we get it, people love rants against the liberal elite today, so here, have a boner.” Nothing is going to come out of Epstein’s death because Trump was as much a friend of his as the Clintons or Hollywood biggies. They’re all in this together and they are masters at making us believe there are actually two sides to support/oppose.
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An Jo
January 13, 2020
Terrific! I posted a tweet about Ricky’s visceral take-down of the Beverly Hills’s folks maybe in the ZEE cinema awards post or something..
Thanks for the post…
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sridharraman
January 14, 2020
It’s interesting how people seem to think he “takes a dig at Greta”. I didn’t read it that way. If anything, his set seemed to evince the need for more and actual activism. 🙂
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Madan
January 14, 2020
sridharraman: He left it pretty open ended and deliberately so, I guess. Interesting too how the left and the right have both completely ignored the fact that he took up Hollywood’s own failings on race and gender parity. Because it is inconvenient to both groups for different reasons. I mean the establishment MSM left here.
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