Schitt’s Creek wins Golden Globe for best TV comedy

“Thank you to the CBC and Pop TV for making the active choice to keep this show on the air and give it the time and space it needed to grow.”

Earlier, O’Hara thanked Eugene and Dan Levy for creating “an inspiring, funny, beautiful family love story in which they let me wear 100 wigs and speak like an alien.”

“Thank you CBC for making this show in Canada,” she said.

Jason Sudeikis bested Eugene Levy for best actor in a television series for his role in Ted Lasso. John Boyega won the award for best supporting actor for his role in Small Axe over Dan Levy.

Schitt’s Creek, which aired on CBC and Pop TV, ended its sixth and final season last April. The Ontario-shot show swept the comedy category at the Emmy Awards last fall.

On a night when the organization that gives out the Golden Globes is facing condemnation for having no Black voting members, the night’s first award went to a Black actor, with Daniel Kaluuya winning best supporting actor in a film for his work in Judas and the Black Messiah.

Kaluuya’s acceptance speech could not be heard from his location at first, and he jokingly shouted, “You did me dirty!” once the audio was restored.

Kaluuya didn’t mention the issue directly in his acceptance, though he praised the man he played to win the award, Blank Panther leader Fred Hampton, who was was killed in an FBI raid in 1969.

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The actor was nominated in 2018 for his leading role in Get Out. He beat out fellow nominees Leslie Odom Jr., Sacha Baron Cohen, Bill Murray and Jared Leto.

Earlier, hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler began the pandemic-era award show by delivering a split-screen opening from separate coasts.

With Poehler at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, Calif., and Fey in New York’s Rainbow Room, the two did an initial gag where Fey reached out through the screen and stroked Poehler’s hair.

The Globes, normally a loose-and-boozy party that serves as the kickoff for Hollywood’s awards season, has been beset with problems beyond the coronavirus leading up to this year’s ceremony. They include a revelation in the Los Angeles Times that the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which gives out the awards, has no Black voting members in the group.

Fey took a shot at the organization in the show opening, explaining to the two small live audiences made up of first responders and essential workers that “the Hollywood Foreign Press Association is made up of around 90 no Black journalists.”

Norman Lear accepted the Carol Burnett Award for his storied career in television, saying he “could not feel more blessed.”

The 98-year-old still-working television legend, creator of All in the Family, The Jeffersons and One Day at a Time, is the third winner of the award that honours “outstanding contributions to television on or off the screen.”

Speaking from what appeared to be his home and sitting in an easy chair, Lear praised the woman for whom the award is named.

“I am convinced that laughter adds time to one’s life, and nobody has made me laugh harder, nobody I owe more time to, than Carol Burnett,” Lear said.

He went on to pay tribute to “a lifetime of partners, performers, associations and creative talents for which I am eternally grateful.”