‘Babel,’ ‘Dreamgirls’ win Golden Globes

updated 11:48 a.m. ET Jan. 16, 2007

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. - “Babel” won best drama and “Dreamgirls” was named best musical or comedy at Monday’s Golden Globes, establishing them as potential front-runners for a showdown at the Academy Awards.

“I swear I have my papers in order, governor, I swear,” “Babel” director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu of Mexico joked after California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger presented the best drama prize for the sweeping ensemble drama that takes place on three continents.

Inarritu’s wisecrack was a highlight of an otherwise ho-hum Globes ceremony, a show that failed to live up to its reputation as a freewheeling Hollywood soiree where stars sometimes cut loose with amusing antics.

The Globes for best dramatic performances were awarded for renditions of two wildly different heads of state: Helen Mirren won best actress as Britain’s priggish monarch Elizabeth II in “The Queen,” while Forest Whitaker took best actor as magnetic but savage Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in “The Last King of Scotland.”

Mirren noted that at age 25 in 1952, Elizabeth “walked into literally the role of a lifetime, and I honestly think this award belongs to her, because I think you fell in love with her, not with me.”

Both Mirren and Whitaker have been regarded as Oscar front-runners since their films debuted last fall.

Mirren also won the Globe for best actress in a TV movie or miniseries as the current monarch’s namesake of centuries ago in “Elizabeth I.”

‘Dreamgirls’ cast has something to sing about
The crowd-pleasing musical “Dreamgirls” also won acting honors for Eddie Murphy and Jennifer Hudson.

Murphy, previously a three-time loser in the best-actor category at the Globes, finally won a major Hollywood honor after a 25-year career in which his fast-talking comic persona made him a superstar while critical acceptance eluded him.

“Wow. I’ll be damned,” said Murphy, who plays a slick soul singer struggling to change with the times and find new relevance as the Motown music scene evolves through the 1960s and ’70s.

“People don’t come to me with supporting roles,” Murphy said backstage. “The reason I responded to this was that it was a great role. I’ve always been open to it; it just never came to me.”

Hudson rose to fame barely two years ago on “American Idol” on the strength of her powerhouse voice, which she uses to great effect in “Dreamgirls,” a film that also shows her remarkable acting range, from brassy comedy to heartbreaking pathos as a soaring vocalist in a Supremes-like singing group.

Slide show   Fashion favorites White and metallic gowns were popular on the Golden Globes’ red carpet this year.

“I had always dreamed but I never ever dreamed this big. This goes far beyond anything I could have ever imagined,” said Hudson, who dedicated her award to the late Florence Ballard, one of the singers from the Supremes on whom her “Dreamgirls” character was based.

After a decades-long drought in which musicals were virtually absent from Hollywood’s lineup, “Dreamgirls” is the third song-and-dance flick to click with audiences in the last five years. “Moulin Rouge” scored a best-picture Oscar nomination for 2001, while “Chicago” won best-picture for 2003, a feat “Dreamgirls” aims to emulate.

Cohen provides evening’s most colorful speech
Sacha Baron Cohen received the Globe for best actor in a movie musical or comedy for his raucous satire “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.”

In colorful anatomical language, Cohen thanked co-star Kenneth Davitian for a naked-wrestling scene in which the heavyset hairy actor rolls around on top of Cohen, who has to breathe the fetid air from his buttocks.

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“Kenneth, if it was not for that rancid bubble, I would not be here today,” Cohen said.

Meryl Streep won her sixth Golden Globe, this one as best actress in a musical or comedy for “The Devil Wears Prada,” in which she plays the boss from hell at a top fashion magazine.

“I think I’ve worked with everybody in the room,” joked Streep, one of Hollywood’s winningest actresses during awards season. “It makes you want to cry with gratitude. Until next year.”

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