The 29th annual PGA Awards are underway as the major guilds now start weighing in on this year’s awards season. The Producers Guild of America’s gala at the Beverly Hilton is presenting winners tonight in 12 categories including the marquee Darryl F. Zanuck Award for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures, with a record 11 nominees in the category. Early winners include Disney/Pixar’s Coco, A&E’s Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath and NBC’s The Voice.
PGA honors tonight are also going to Universal’s Donna Langley with the Milestone Award, Ryan Murphy with the Norman Lear Achievement Award in Television, Charles Roven with the David O. Selznick Achievement Award in Theatrical Motion Pictures, Jordan Peele’s Get Out with the Stanley Kramer Award (it is not a best picture nominee tonight), and Ava DuVernay with the Visionary Award.
Follow along and keep refreshing for the latest winners:
9:05 PM: WINNER – David L. Wolper Award for Outstanding Producer of Long-Form Television: Black Mirror (Season 4) (Producers: Annabel Jones, Charlie Brooker)
9:01 PM: More Peele: “When I set out to do this movie, I had to ask myself, what really scares me. I know what you’re thinking, but it’s not white people. It’s silence. Get Out is my protest against that. … That’s how I came up with the idea for the sunken place… the sunken place is the system that silences the voice of women, minorities, of other people. It’s the system … it’s where we are relegated to when he screams of police brutality go ignored. The sunken place.. for the dignity and disrespect for Haiti…. The sunken place is the president who calls athletes sons of bitches for expressing their believes on the field, and the homeland of our most beautiful immigrants shitholes. Every day there was proof that we are in the sunken place.”
8:56 PM: Nice start from Peele: There is no Get Out without Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner, referencing Kramer.
8:47 PM: From Lear, who says he’s seen the film three times. “The gift of Jordan Peele’s movie is about the terror of being black in America. The movie itself is terrifying. It’s a horror movie where the black guy isn’t the first one being killed… a lot of the success of Get Out comes from its freshness.”
8:46 PM: Norman Lear is presenting Get Out with the Stanley Kramer Award, which goes to “a production, producer or other individuals whose achievement or contribution illuminates and raises public awareness of important social issues. Lear certainly knows about that. Loving won this award last year.
8:43 PM: WINNER – Outstanding Producer of Competition Television – The Voice (Season 12, Season 13) (Producers: John de Mol, Mark Burnett, Audrey Morrissey, Lee Metzger, Chad Hines, Amanda Zucker, Kyra Thompson, Jay Bienstock, Stijn Bakkers, Mike Yurchuk, Teddy Valenti, Carson Daly)
8:38 PM: Remini onstage: “As producers you know what it means to take a risk, to back a bold project. Recognition by our peers means a lot when you’re trying to change the status quo… that’s A&E for “having the balls to air this. And I couldn’t be more grateful to how our audiences have embraced this conversation… the goliath that has been Scientology, an organization that uses its power and its money to intimidate… it is their policy to actually do so. But as evidenced tonight, they have not succeeded. To our brave contributors who have endured the pain of … there’s an awakening going on and hopefully in part because of the important work that producers are doing.”
8:37 PM: WINNER – Outstanding Producer of Non-Fiction Television: Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath (Season 1, Season 2) (Producers: Leah Remini, Eli Holzman, Aaron Saidman, Myles Reiff, Adam Saltzberg, Erin Gamble, Lisa Rosen, Grainne Byrne, Taylor Levin, Alex Weresow, Rachelle Mendez)
8:34 PM: The awards are interspersed with clips from the Outstanding Theatrical Motion Picture category nominees. Good intro from Kumail Nanjiani just now for The Big Sick: He said he pitched different names for the movie including “Pakistani-Hall” and “Who’s Coma to Dinner.” Timothee Chalamet followed with a clip from Call Me By Your Name — not as funny, but he tried.
8:33 PM: More from Langley: “I may only be the third woman to receive this award tonight. But if we get this right, I’m going to be far from the last.”
8:26 PM: Langley has done 10 films with Apatow, to which she joked: “He learned a lot from me…you’re welcome.” She also took a moment to address the death of fellow producer Allison Shearmur yesterday of lung cancer at age 54: “She was an extraordinary friend to many in the room.”
8:15 PM: Judd Apatow is now presenting the PGA’s Milestone Award to Universal’s Donna Langley. It’s the first of five honorary awards tonight. He went through a laundry list of people who turned down the task of introducing her: Meryl Streep, Angelina Jolie, Matt Damon, the bear from Ted and Kevin Spacey. (Note: Apatow is emceeing the DGA Awards next month.) As for Langley he says, “She takes chances” and “she is creating opportunities for women and people of color — something our industry needs to work on.”
8:13 PM: Anderson onstage: “As we know, cinema is a powerful means for engendering empathy… Now is the time for more diversity and building bridges across the world. Respect matters, dignity matters and keeping families together matters. Finally this award is dedicated to the country and people of Mexico.”
8:12 PM: WINNER: Outstanding Producer of Animated Theatrical Motion Pictures – Coco (Producer: Darla K. Anderson)
8:07 PM: PGA Presidents Gary Lucchesi and Lori McCreary are taking the stage and the ceremony is underway. They are addressing sexual harassment right off the bat. McCreary: “It’s our duty to protect the teams working with us.” The PGA earlier this week unveiled new guidelines for its members.
8:01 PM: The show should be starting soon, after sponsor Cadillac spent the pre-show giving away cars for a week to someone at each table in the ballroom.