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5 Wokest Moments of the Golden Globes

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Last year might have been the Year of the Trump Jokes, but it’s clear that 2018 is going to be defined by a reckoning more social and cultural than political. So it goes without saying that, as the first major awards ceremony of the year, the Golden Globes had a lot of pressure to live up to. And it delivered. Here’s our roundup of the five best moments of the night.

1. Seth Meyers’ opening monologue: The comedian and late-night host’s monologue was off to a great start with this one-line zinger— “Good evening, ladies and remaining gentlemen”—and he followed it up with pointed barbs at Harvey Weinstein and Kevin Spacey, though the joke of the night might have been the one aimed at Woody Allen. In speaking of Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water, Meyers’ quipped: “I have to admit, when I first heard it was a movie about a naive young woman falling in love with a disgusting sea creature, I thought, ‘Man, not another Woody Allen movie.’”

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2.E! getting called out multiple times by actresses on E!: A few weeks ago, Catt Sadler publicly left her position as host of E! News after she discovered that her similarly-qualified male co-host was earning nearly double her salary. This stunning wage disparity was called out by several actresses on the red carpet, including Debra Messing, Eva Longoria, Sarah Jessica Parker and Laura Dern, while they were being interviewed live on—none other than—E! News.

3.Activists on the red carpet: In addition to the symbolic, industry-wide gesture of wearing black to the ceremony, eight actresses chose to use their time on the red carpet wisely, sharing space with activists making a powerful difference to women’s lives through their work. The activists included Tarana Burke, founder of the #MeToo movement and senior director of the non-profit Girls for Gender Equity, who arrived with Michelle Williams; Ai-jen Poo, director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, who spoke alongside Meryl Streep; and Marai Larasi, executive director of Imkaan, a network of organisations working to end violence against women and girls of colour in the UK, who was accompanied by Emma Watson.

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4.Natalie Portman’s snide dig: While introducing the evening’s nominees for best director alongside Ron Howard, Portman said: “And here are the all-male nominees.” (Cue awkward looks on the faces of the five men nominated.) In a year with standout films by women directors—Lady Bird by Greta Gerwig, Wonder Woman by Patty Jenkins and Mudbound by Dee Rees—the elision of women in the category deserved to be called out. Who knew Natalie Portman had it in her?

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5.Oprah’s speech: And we’re going to end this round-up the way the Globes should have ended—with Oprah’s speech. It was a historic moment in and of itself—Winfrey is the first black woman to receive the Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award—but of course, she hit it out of the park with a deeply inspiring and life-affirming speech, bringing the audience to its feet more than once, and eliciting a flood of #Oprah2020 tweets (Twitter’s version of a standing ovation).

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