Nomadland Also Takes Best Director and Most Visually Striking Film; Acting Honors Go to Chadwick Boseman, Carey Mulligan, Yuh-Jung Youn and Daniel Kaluuya
Dolly Parton Named ‘Wilde Artist,’ Rachel McAdams Accepts for Campiest Flick Eurovision Song Contest
GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics, founded in 2009 and comprised of over 280 professional journalists covering film and television, held its first-ever Dorians Film Toast 2021 awards television special Sunday, April 18 on the streaming service Revry at revry.tv, where it was announced that Nomadland and Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom were the top films of 2020.
Nomadland was named Best Film with Chloé Zhao winning Best Director and her partner and cinematographer Joshua James Richards sharing the Most Visually Striking Film award. Producer Peter Spears (who also produced 2017 GALECA winner Call Me By Your Name) said, “I was thinking how incredibly cool, how important it is to have that queer voice in our film critic universe.” Spears continued, “It also has to do with what’s eccentric, unconventional and differing in some way from what is the usual and the norm—and that is so much of what Nomadland is about.”
Zhao said her Dorian for directing Nomadland is “deeply meaningful” because “Oscar Wilde is one of my greatest heroes,” and because the film speaks to so many segments of society facing tough times. “Nomadland is about a woman who goes on a journey of grief and healing and ultimately of self-discovery and self-acceptance.”
George C. Wolfe, the legendary Broadway fixture who directed Best LGBTQ Film winner Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, marveled at how the biopic’s subject was “beyond an out lesbian” in the South in the 1920s. “I accept this award on behalf of Ma Rainey.”
Boseman was “such an incredible human, scholar, humanitarian, and a really wonderful actor,” said Ma Rainey’s costar Colman Domingo, accepting via a recorded video on behalf of Boseman and his family. “Creating complex roles about the African-American experience, and about people who are marginalized in society and trying to stand up and have a strong voice, fighting for representation—that is Chadwick Boseman’s legacy.”
Pretty Young Woman star Carey Mulligan, fascinatingly mischievous as a woman out to avenge the death of a female friend, and the mystery’s witty screenwriter, Emerald Fennell, both delighted with their humble acceptance videos for Best Film Performance—Actress and Best Screenplay, respectively. “I’m just so happy that (Woman) has resonated, and I’m so grateful to (Fennell) for inviting me along for the ride,” said Mulligan. Fennell, meanwhile, graciously spoke of her “admiration for (GALECA’s) members.”
Best Supporting Performance – Actor winner Daniel Kaluuya, honored for his portrayal of martyred Black Panther Party leader Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah, said he was glad that more people were learning about what Hampton “stood for, what he believed, and what he did for the Black community and the community at large. I really hope that he continues to live on in everyone’s hearts and minds.”
Best Supporting Performance – Actress went to Youn Yuh-jung for Minari, for her portrayal of the fiery and spirited grandmother in Lee Isaac Chung’s American dream story Minari, which also took the Non-English Language Film win.
Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Laverne Cox, both performers who’ve taken to producing documentaries, saw their respective projects, Welcome to Chechnya and Disclosure, tie for the win in two categories: Best Documentary and Best LGBTQ Documentary. A grave Ferguson said Chechnya, which details the persecution of LGBTQ people in the Eastern European republic, is about “people fighting genocide.” Cox, in discussing her film’s look at the history of transgender representation on screen, noted that “2020 was the deadliest year on record for trans people. We have to continue to highlight the humanity of trans people in the face of us being dehumanized.”
Radha Blank was named the “We’re Wilde About You!” Rising Star Award winner for her directorial debut The Forty-Year-Old Version, which she also wrote and starred in.
“GALECA’s wonderful members don’t seem like the type of people to wait for affirmation from what the popular crowd says,” said Blank, resplendent in persimmon-framed glasses. “No, these are people who decide and celebrate those of us who march to a different drummer.” She added that, with her film The Forty-Year-Old Version’s win for Best Unsung Film category, its “lovely and talented artists”—several of them newbies to filmmaking—”get to shine a little bit brighter.”
The Wilde Artist Award, meant for “a truly groundbreaking force in entertainment,” went to singer-songwriter-actress-humanitarian Dolly Parton, whose memorable role in the landmark feminist comedy 9 to 5 has generated revived interest just as she made headlines for her deep-pocketed advocacy in helping get Americans vaccinated during the pandemic.
“Thank you to all the members of the Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics for this lovely Wilde Artist award,” Parton relayed in statement via her publicist. “I’m not sure I’m as edgy as past winners (in the Wilde Artist category) like Todd Haynes, Kate McKinnon, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jordan Peele—but I am honored and humbled. I appreciate all of you entertainment journalists who are so passionate and are working so hard. Keep up the good work!”
The Timeless Star award, honoring an actor or performer whose exemplary career has been marked by character, wisdom and wit, was paid tribute in video form ahead of a segment featuring the star himself: Billie Holiday’s director Lee Daniels, Cheyenne Jackson (Jordan’s costar in the Fox sitcom Call Me Kat), Beth Grant (sharing a ribald behind-the-scenes story back from their days filming 2000’s cult hit Sordid Lives) and Leslie Grossman (a pal from TV’s American Horror Story 1984). Summed up Grossman about Jordan’s accomplishments, including a new gospel CD: “At a time when our world is as divided as its ever been, there is one thing that everybody can agree on and that is their love for Leslie Jordan. You’ve done it all: Book, television, movies, social media, an album . . . and we know you’re just getting started.” This career achievement accolade was previously awarded to the likes of Sir Ian McKellen, Jane Fonda, George Takei, John Waters, Lily Tomlin, Betty White and Dame Angela Lansbury.
GALECA Trailblazer Award winner Isabel Sandoval, in a chat with Board member Jazz Tangcay of Variety, suggests she isn’t daunted writing, directing, starring in and even editing her own films—even as she realized she was trans while making her first movie and was actually transitioning during the filming of her most recent acclaimed drama, Lingua Franca. Says the ultra-focused filmmaker: “I have one role, and that’s to tell a story. If people like Fassbinder and Xavier Dolan can do it, I can do it as well.”
Gay entertainment and broadcasting veteran Karel will hosted the Dorians Toast, a twist on the standard awards show combining tributes, interview segments, music, and comedy and also included lively roundtable chats with GALECA’s members about the nominees in several categories.
Movies with a theatrical or digital theatrical release from January 1, 2020, to February 28, 2021, were considered. GALECA hosts two separate Dorian Awards during the year, honoring the best in film and TV, from mainstream to LGBTQ fare. For more information on category requirements for the film awards and TV awards, along with how GALECA’s membership votes on nominees and winners, at DoriansToast.com and GALECA.org.
Presenters included Academy Award-nominated director Lee Daniels (The United States vs. Billie Holiday), Cheyenne Jackson (Call Me Kat), Rosanna Arquette (Pulp Fiction), Academy Award nominee Gabourey Sidibe (Precious, Antebellum), Emmy Award winner Jharrel Jerome (When They See Us, Moonlight, Concrete Cowboy), Rafael Silva (Fluidity, 9-1-1 Lone Star), Harmony Valle-Ramirez (Room To Grow), comedian Margaret Cho, Charo, and more. The virtual ceremony will also feature a musical performance by Morgan Mallory, “Look Into The Light,” written and composed by Karel and Mallory. Dorians Film Toast 2021 is hosted, co-written and executive produced by Karel and co-produced by Brandon Riley Miller (Life in Segments, High) and John Griffiths for GALECA.
Leslie Jordan received the Society’s Timeless Star career achievement honor, and transgender writer-director-actress Isabel Sandoval accepts the inaugural GALECA Trailblazer Award.
Complete list of Dorian Film Awards nominees and winners as they are announced:
Best Film
Best LGBTQ Film
Best Non-English Language Film
Best Director
Best Screenplay (original or adapted)
Best Unsung Film – Presented by Stoli®
Best Documentary (tie)
Best LGBTQ Documentary (tie)
Best Film Performance — Actress
Best Film Performance — Actor
Best Film Performance — SUPPORTING Actress
Best Film Performance — SUPPORTING Actor
Most Visually Striking Film
Campiest Flick
“We’re Wilde About You!” Rising Star Award
Wilde Artist Award (to a truly groundbreaking force in entertainment)
The Dorians Film Toast 2021 is currently available on-demand on Revry including The Roku Channel, Samsung TV Plus, Comcast Xfinity X1, Cox, Distro TV, Plex, Galaxy TV, Local Now, VIZIO, Zapping TV, STIRR, TiVo, and LGBTQ+ virtual reality channel on RAD available on PlayStation devices.
The show was also co-written and executive produced by Karel, and coproduced by Brandon Riley Miller (“Life in Segments,” “High”) and John Griffiths for GALECA.
Photos courtesy of Searchlight Pictures and David Lee / Netflix
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