Julia Roberts jury-rigged her dress with pins, George Clooney tried out his new stand-up material, Bob Dylan and Al Pacino got the standing O, and Elizabeth Taylor...well, we're not quite sure what to make of her near-meltdown grand finale.
But hey, it made for great TV.
Once again living up to its looser-than-Oscar image, the 58th Annual Golden Globe Awards brought glitz, glamour and gumption to NBC Sunday night, as 22.5 million viewers tuned to the three-hour telecast to watch the star-studded dinner bash from the Beverly Hilton Hotel.
According to preliminary numbers, NBC's 8-11 p.m. broadcast averaged a 14.7 rating and 22 share in households. That made the Hollywood Foreign Press Association's annual schmoozefest the third-highest-rated awards show of the past year, behind only ABC's 2000 Oscar telecast (29.2 rating/48 share) and CBS' Grammy Awards (17.3 rating/27 share).
The ceremony has come a long way since leaving the cable TV hinterlands for NBC in 1996. The show has beat the Emmy Awards in total viewers for four years running (no offense, TV stars). And overall, the Golden Globes inched up 10 percent among younger viewers (10.0 rating/22 share in the advertiser-friendly adults 18-49 demographic) and 2 percent among total viewers this time around.
All told, the Globe telecast--real shocker--obliterated the competition Sunday night, including CBS' Touched by an Angel and ABC's Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.
Meanwhile, in other post-Globe news, Elizabeth Taylor's camp has not commented on the Hollywood legend's confusing appearance at the end of Sunday night's ceremony. Taylor began ripping into the envelope for the best picture drama winner, almost giving away the winner, before producer Dick Clark ending up walking out and informing her she should probably read the nominees first.
Disaster ultimately was averted, and La Liz wished a good evening to "y'all...y'all...y'all."
