{"id":39845,"date":"2025-07-05T04:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-05T04:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/39845\/"},"modified":"2025-07-05T04:19:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-05T04:19:08","slug":"behind-golden-globes-new-turmoil-and-unresolved-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/39845\/","title":{"rendered":"Behind Golden Globes\u2019 New Turmoil and Unresolved Issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tWhat is the Hollywood Foreign Press Association<\/a> without the Golden Globes<\/a>? We may soon find out.<\/p>\n

\n\tFor 80 years, dozens of Los Angeles-based print and photo journalists for non-American publications comprised and ran the HFPA, a nonprofit best known for its annual awards ceremony. But in 2023, the HFPA \u2014 having faced widespread criticism for its ethics, financial practices and lack of diversity since a 2021 Los Angeles Times expos\u00e9<\/a>, which resulted in the loss of the TV broadcasting deal that provided the organization with most of its revenue \u2014\u00a0sold the Globes to Dick Clark Productions (which shares a parent company, PMC, with The Hollywood Reporter) and Eldridge (a holding company owned by Todd Boehly<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

\n\tThe deal<\/a>, which was approved by a majority of the HFPA\u2019s roughly 90 members, dictated that the HFPA would be dissolved and its members, many of whom had collected salaries from the HFPA (totaling $5.2 million in the fiscal year ending in June 2023, per an IRS filing), would become employees of a new for-profit Golden Globes organization (and would be paid either $250,000 up-front or $75,000 per year for five years). Helen Hoehne<\/strong>, who had been the president of the HFPA, would become president of the Golden Globes organization. And, as part of an effort to increase the diversity of the voting body, hundreds of other journalists from all around the world would be invited to become unpaid members.<\/p>\n

\n\tOver the two years since that deal was finalized \u2014\u00a0during which the Golden Globes organization has implemented bylaws and policies that have helped to regain the industry\u2019s confidence and landed its awards ceremony back <\/a>on network TV \u2014 the number of former HFPA members within the organization, or\u00a0\u201clegacy voters,\u201d\u00a0has decreased to about 60, mostly as a result of expulsions and terminations for cause (e.g. former HFPA president<\/a> Philip Berk<\/strong>) and deaths (e.g. longtime HFPA member<\/a> Judy Solomon<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, those remaining legacy voters have become increasingly unhappy, particularly since Hoehne informed them <\/a>earlier this year that the Golden Globes organization would be discontinuing the $75,000-per-year payments out of concern that they \u201ccould add to a perception of bias in voting.\u201d Legacy voters were offered a severance of $102,500 \u2014 which, a spokesperson for the Globes organization later said, fulfilled its contractual obligation to them \u2014 and were invited to reapply for Globes membership moving forward.<\/p>\n

\n\tOn Monday, as was first reported by The Ankler, numerous people who had served on the board of the HFPA prior to the 2023 deal convened and voted to reconstitute the HFPA. Their position, according to people close to that conversation, is that the 2023 deal was nullified by DCP and Eldridge\u2019s decision to terminate their compensation, as well as by failing to honor other assurances that they say they were provided related to travel allowances, seats at the award ceremony and lifetime voting privileges. And they are calling on the office of California\u2019s Attorney General Rob Bonta<\/strong>, which oversees nonprofits and charities, and has yet to provide final signoff on the 2023 deal, to intervene. (The legacy voters also appear to have lost faith in Hoehne, who was one of their own, but who they now regard with suspicion, and voted on Thursday to oust her from their board, as TheWrap first reported. She remains president of the Golden Globes organization.)<\/p>\n

\n\tBut not everyone associated with the legacy voters supports their current efforts. Jeff Harris<\/strong> and Dr. Joanna Dodd Massey<\/strong>, two of the three non-members who the HFPA appointed <\/a>to its board in 2021 as part of an effort to reform itself in the wake of the Times expos\u00e9, and who negotiated the HFPA\u2019s sale on behalf of its members, resigned from the board this week. Massey, in a letter obtained by THR, wrote to the board, \u201cWe approved and executed a binding legal agreement to sell the Golden Globes and dissolve the HFPA \u2014 an action I believe the membership supported in order to preserve the Golden Globes and continue their admirable charitable work. That decision reflected a difficult but undeniable reality: the Hollywood community made clear it would not support the Globes as long as the HFPA members remained involved. The transaction was conducted with full transparency and due process, as all of the paperwork, notes\/recordings and emails demonstrate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMassey continued, \u201cThe current effort to reverse it \u2014 by questioning the deal, reviving the HFPA, and reinstating memberships \u2014 is, in my view, fundamentally flawed and legally without merit. I had hoped to remain on the board to support a good-faith examination of the facts. However, based on what I\u2019ve been told about [Monday\u2019s] meeting, it is clear that exploration is not the goal and reversing the deal is.\u201d She added, \u201cIn my experience as an Independent Director on several public and private company boards, the actions now being taken by the board represent a clear breach of fiduciary duty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe question now is whether or not ownership of the Golden Globes awards ceremony is actually in question.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe office of California\u2019s Attorney General wrote to DCP and Eldridge attorneys in a May 17, 2023 missive obtained by THR: \u201cThe Attorney General has no authority to review and therefore takes no position on Hollywood Foreign Press Association\u2019s proposed transaction except with respect to the assets subject to a charitable trust (5% of the net profits of the Golden Globe Awards).\u201d In other words, the only aspect of the 2023 deal that even required or requires approval by the State is the transfer of the HFPA\u2019s charitable trust, now known as the Golden Globe Foundation<\/a>. And according to numerous sources, the only reason that signoff hasn\u2019t yet been provided is because individual legacy voters have been flooding the AG\u2019s office with complaints, which has delayed the process.<\/p>\n

\n\tIf the newly reconstituted HFPA were to convince the AG to not sign off on the deal, would that derail only the charitable trust component, or the entire pact? If the former, then again, the question is, what is the HFPA without the Golden Globes, which is what generated the funds for its charitable trust prior to the deal? If the latter, then would the Golden Globes \u2014\u00a0the next edition of which has already been set to air on CBS and stream on Paramount+ on Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026<\/a> \u2014\u00a0once again be boycotted by the industry? And would legacy voters also have to return the compensation that they have received over the last two years from DCP and Eldridge?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe may never find out the answers to these questions, some are speculating, because if a financial settlement can be reached to make the HFPA\u2019s legacy voters drop any and all grievances that they have with the Golden Globes organization, then the office of California\u2019s Attorney General would not have any reason to intervene.<\/p>\n

\n\tDCP and Eldridge representatives declined comment. Reynolds Cafferata<\/strong>, an attorney representing the legacy voters, and the office of California\u2019s AG, did not immediately respond to comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What is the Hollywood Foreign Press Association without the Golden Globes? We may soon find out. For 80…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":39846,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[171,31782,31783,31784,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-39845","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-golden-globe-foundation","10":"tag-golden-globes","11":"tag-hollywood-foreign-press-association","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39845"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39845\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}