ARTS&LIFE
TV & FILM

T

he Golden Globe awards, for 
excellence in TV and film, will be 
awarded on Sunday, Feb. 28, at 8 
p.m. Due to the pandemic, the Globes 
will be a virtual event. Norman Lear, 
98, the creator of many great TV shows, 
including All in the Family will receive the 
“Carol Burnett Award” for “outstanding 
contributions to television.”
Unlike many years, there is no Jewish 
nominee in the film (drama) actor/actress 
categories (there are five nominees in 
all Globe categories). However, Gary 
Oldman is nominated for a best actor 
(drama) Globe for playing Jewish screen-
writer Herman Mankiewicz in Mank.
The best actor, comedy or musical 
film category has two Jewish nominees: 
Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat Subsequent 
Moviefilm) and Andy Samberg, 42 (Palm 
Springs). Cohen played star character 

Borat, as well as co-writing this “mocku-
mentary.” Samberg played an affable guy 
who finds himself living the same day 
over and over.
The best actress (musical/comedy 
film) nominees include Kate Hudson, 
41, who had a star role in Music, a film 
most critics disliked. She plays a reformed 
drug dealer who takes care of her autistic 
half-sister.
Sacha Baron Cohen, 49, is also nomi-
nated for best supporting actor (film) for 
playing 1960s radical Abbie Hoffman in 
The Trial of the Chicago 7. Aaron Sorkin, 
59, who wrote and directed the film is 
the sole Jewish nominee in the best (film) 
director and best (film) screenplay cate-
gories.
Composer James Newton Howard, 
69, is nominated for best original score 
(News of the World) and Diane Warren, 

64, is up for a Globe for co-writing the 
original song “Seen” for the film The 
Life Ahead.
One nominee for the best animat-
ed film Globe, Over the Moon, has a 
poignant asterisk. It was written by 
Audrey Lederer Wells, who died of 
cancer in 2018, at age 58. The film 
is dedicated to her. Her late father, 
Wolfgang Lederer, an Austrian 
Jew, fled from the Nazis, joined the 
American army and fought from 
D-Day until he was severely injured in 
early 1945. He was highly decorated 
and left the army as a major. The car-
nage of war led him to become a psy-
chiatrist and many of his patients were 
Holocaust survivors.
A Holocaust survivor is the central 
character of The Life Ahead, a best 
foreign language film nominee. Sophia 
Loren plays a retired prostitute who 
is also a Jewish Holocaust survivor. 
She forms an unlikely friendship with 
a Muslim boy. This film got mixed 
reviews, unlike the 1977 film Madame 
Rosa, which was based on the same 
novel by Romain Gary. It won the 
Oscar for best foreign film and French 
actress Simone Signoret (whose father 
was Jewish) was, frankly, better than 
Loren in the same role.
 The Trial of the Chicago 7 is nomi-
nated for best drama film. It competes 
with Mank, which, as I said, is about a 
“real” Jew. The director and screenwriter 
of Mank aren’t Jewish. There are eight 
important real-life Jewish characters in 
the film and no Jewish actors or actresses 
play them (Oy, you say? I agree).
The best film (musical or comedy) cat-
egory has many more Jewish connections. 
Borat Subsequent Moviefilm was, as I’ve 
noted, co-written by Sacha Baron Cohen. 
It was directed by Jason Woliner, 40. Also 
nominated in this category are Hamilton, 
directed by Thomas Kail, 43; The Prom, 
a musical whose songs were co-written by 

34 | FEBRUARY 25 • 2021 

ANIKA MOLNAR/NETFLIX

Amit Rahav 
and Shira 
Haas in 
Unorthodox

Global

Gold

The most complete Jewish guide 
to the 2021 Golden Globes.

NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST

