If you were watching the Golden Globe Awards on Sunday night, then you likely caught actress Meryl Streep‘s acceptance speech for the Cecil B. DeMille Award, an honorary award given by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association to a performer for their “outstanding contributions to the world of entertainment.” The 67-year-old, three-time Oscar-winning actress used her time on stage to address concerns about Donald J. Trump without actually naming the U.S. President-Elect.
Streep, who’s voiced was strained from “screaming and lamentation this weekend,” she said, referring to the memorial she attended for actresses Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, made her first allusion to Trump and his incoming regime after thanking the Hollywood Foreign Press Association: “You [HFPA] and all of us in this room really belong to the most vilified segments in American society right now. Think about it: Hollywood, foreigners and the press.”
Watch the full acceptance speech here below.
The three segments she mentioned are ones that the recently elected Trump, who’s currently retaining his executive producer credit on the NBC TV reality show The Apprentice, has called out over the election season.
The award-winning actress then went on to mention several entertainers, some of whom she pointed out were not from the United States, like Oscar-winning actress Natalie Portman (born in Jerusalem); Golden Globe-nominated Ruth Negga (born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, raised in Ireland); and Canadian Ryan Gosling, who won the Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture, Comedy or Musical for La La Land.
Steep went on to allude to Trump once more when she spoke about his mocking of a disabled reporter:
But there was one performance this year that stunned me. It sank its hooks in my heart. Not because it was good; there was nothing good about it. But it was effective and it did its job. It made its intended audience laugh, and show their teeth. It was that moment when the person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter. Someone he outranked in privilege, power and the capacity to fight back. It kind of broke my heart when I saw it, and I still can’t get it out of my head, because it wasn’t in a movie. It was real life. And this instinct to humiliate, when it’s modeled by someone in the public platform, by someone powerful, it filters down into everybody’s life, because it kinda gives permission for other people to do the same thing. Disrespect invites disrespect, violence incites violence. And when the powerful use their position to bully others we all lose. O.K., go on with it.
She went on to urge the press to hold Trump accountable, “We need the principled press to hold power to account, to call him on the carpet for every outrage,” and asked that that everyone support the Committee to Protect Journalists, which, according to their website, is an “independent, nonprofit organization that promotes press freedom worldwide” that “defends the right of journalists to report the news without fear of reprisal.”
Streep ended her acceptance speech by mentioning advice from her friend, the late Carrie Fisher: “As my friend, the dear departed Princess Leia, said to me once, take your broken heart, make it into art.”
After the speech, social media was buzzing, awaiting response from Trump, who is a well-known, avid Twitter user, but as of this writing, the President-Elect has not posted anything in reference to Streep or the Globes ceremony. Instead, he told the NY Times in a phone interview that while he did not see the telecast or hear Streep’s comments, he was “‘not surprised’ that he had come under attack from ‘liberal movie people.'” He also referred to the actress as a “a Hillary lover,” referencing his former political opponent Hillary Clinton.
Streep was not the only attendee at the Globes to reference Trump. While accepting the award for Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Limited Series or TV Movie for The Night Manager, British actor Hugh Laurie joked that he can say he won the award at the “last-ever Golden Globe Awards” because it has the words “Hollywood Foreign Press” in the title, so he doesn’t know what to expect in the future.
Regarding the three words “Hollywood, foreign, and press,” Hollywood has been outspoken against Trump; Trump has spoken out against foreigners; and Trump frequently refers to the press on his Twitter account as “dishonest media” and has said he plans to open up libel laws against journalists.
After Streep’s speech, celebrities took to Twitter in support:
Donald J. Trump’s inauguration and swearing-in as the 45th president of the United States will take place on January 20, 2017. So far, no major performers have been booked for the inaugural outdoor concert at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, though the Rockettes, after some controversy, are scheduled to appear at an event, as is the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, who have performed at five past inaugural ceremonies. Jackie Evancho, the 16-year-old former America’s Got Talent contestant who has previously performed for current U.S. President Obama, is confirmed as booked for an event. The Beach Boys reportedly were invited, but have yet to announce their decision. Rebecca Ferguson, who is a former runner-up on the UK’s X-Factor reality show, said she was invited to perform, but would only do so if she could sing “Strange Fruit,” the 1939 Billie Holiday song that protests American racism and the lynching of African Americans. The Trump transition team has not confirmed Ferguson’s participation at this time. They’ve also said that the swearing-in ceremony is “not Woodstock” or a “summer jam” and that “it’s not a concert.”
UPDATE: As predicted, Trump fired off a response to Streep on Twitter. Starting at 6:27 AM, the President-Elect posted a three-part reply to Streep’s speech, including her mentioning of his mocking of a disabled reporter.
In Trump’s response, he called the multiple Oscar-winning actress “overrated,” something people on social media also predicted he’d say, as he’s used that word many times before. Here are some of those predictions (posted to Twitter before Trump’s response):
Video
Meryl Streep Acceptance Speech at the 2017 Golden Globes
You can read the full transcript of the speech over at the NY Times.
Hugh Laurie Wins Best Supporting TV Actor at the 2017 Golden Globes
Hugh Laurie accepts the award for Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Limited Series or TV Movie at the 74th Annual Golden Globe Awards.
[Image Credit: Paul Drinkwater/NBC, courtesy of NBC. Used with permission.]
Follow me on Twitter and Instagram.
We do need a principled press. Where have they been over the past 8 years?
Comment by morphoyle — January 9, 2017 @ 6:33 am
The same place as principled neocons, apparently.
Comment by MadMike R5D4 — January 10, 2017 @ 1:20 am
Those never existed in the first place.
Comment by morphoyle — January 12, 2017 @ 8:43 am