The Golden Globes, which happened on January 7th this year, managed to cause quite an uproar due to the controversial host, Jo Koy. One might think Koy would be a fine host, considering he’s a stand-up comedian. Turns out that while Jo is certainly a comedian, he’s not a very good one.
The one good thing to be said about Koy’s opening monologue is that it was memorable. Unfortunately, that’s because it was decidedly awful. He began by talking about Oppenheimer, which (if you somehow don’t know by now) is a movie about the making of the atomic bomb. Koy moved on pretty quickly from that to speak about Barbie, and most of the jokes he made did not land with the live audience or the at-home viewers.
Considering Barbie is a movie that primarily focuses on female struggles and empowerment, Jo Koy’s commentary would be considered distasteful, to put it mildly. Instead of making jokes that respected the message of the movie, Koy centered his routine around how attracted he was to Margot Robbie during the film. So yes, his commentary objectified the lead actress in a movie entirely about the objectification of women. Irony at its finest.
The horrors didn’t stop there, either. Singer Taylor Swift was present at the Golden Globes this year, and of course, Koy had something to say about that. “The big difference between the Golden Globes and the NFL? At the Golden Globes, we have fewer camera shots of Taylor Swift,” Koy joked. After that statement, the cameras cut to an entirely unamused Taylor Swift, so safe to say that joke didn’t land.
There’s something to say for self-awareness, and Koy was certainly aware that the audience didn’t find him funny. He paused in the middle of his speech to blame his writers for the issues and claimed he hadn’t had enough time to write good jokes. Not the best way to handle it, I would say.
Since then, other hosts of other awards shows have made digs at Koy. His jokes were not well-received, which is a good thing. With the Oscars coming up, audiences eagerly await any more dramatics that may come up.
