Directors Guild of America Awards: 6 Best Moments

The 70th annual Directors Guild of America Awards delivered an evening of laughter and reflection Saturday night as Hollywood continues to reckon with issues of inclusion, sexual harassment, and more.

Held at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, inside the same ballroom where the Time’s Up movement made a very visible entry into the world just under a month ago at the Golden Globes, the DGA ceremony offered a few surprises and played tribute to the directors creating the best cinema and television. Judd Apatow was on hand to host, lending his signature humor to the proceedings.

Both Jordan Peele (Get Out) and Guillermo del Toro (The Shape of Water) won their first-ever DGA awards. Women dominated the television field, with Reed Morano and Beth McCarthy Miller taking home top prizes for their work on The Handmaid’s Tale and Veep.

Each of the five nominees for the top prize of the night (for feature film) received a DGA medallion and spoke about what their nomination meant to them and their project. Del Toro all but cemented The Shape of Water’s Oscar success with his win, as only three victorious directors in the last 20 years have not gone on to follow up with Oscar gold.

Here are the six best moments of the night.

Introduced by DGA President Thomas Schlamme with the cutting words, “Trainwreck, 40-Year-Old Virgin — not just nicknames for Donald Trump and Mike Pence,” Apatow took the stage to kick off the night with a bang.

In a nearly 10-minute monologue that felt more like a stand-up comedy routine, Apatow took aim at everyone from Matt Damon to Harvey Weinstein to Mel Gibson. “One bad moment where I talk like Matt Damon and explain sexual harassment and I am f—ed,” he began, explaining the pitfalls of his agreeing to the hosting job. He riffed on how Weinstein ruined robes (“Now it’s like the costume of Jabba the Hutt”); mocked Daniel Day-Lewis and male actors who stay in character 24/7 (“Sally Hawkins isn’t mute during lunchtime”); and joked about watching Dunkirk on his phone and his iPad as it was “meant to be seen.”

Much of his humor was reserved for skewering Hollywood’s own failings, particularly the issue of diversity and inclusion when it comes to directing jobs. “It’s a diverse year at the Director’s Guild — the nominees for best film are directed by an Englishman, a woman, a Mexican, an Irishman, and an African-American. No Jews, pretty good, that’s progress,” he ribbed.

(Excerpt) Read More at: EW.com