How the Golden Globes Went From Laughingstock to Power Player

LOS ANGELES — The Golden Globes were created by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association in 1944 and quickly developed a reputation as unserious and slippery.

In the late 1960s, the Federal Communications Commission got the Globes booted from the airwaves, saying it “misled the public as to how the winners were determined.” CBS dropped it in 1982 after Pia Zadora was named “new star of the year,” a plaudit essentially paid for by her billionaire husband, Meshulam Riklis, who flew H.F.P.A. members to Las Vegas and wined and dined them at his Riviera hotel and casino.

Hollywood viewed the awards as meaningless at best and corrupt at worst — most notable for their open bar and the industry perks enjoyed by their some 80 voting members. Jack Mathews, who was a film critic for Newsday, once called them “the best-fed freeloaders in the entertainment industry.” When the Rob Reiner film “A Few Good Men” lost the best drama prize to “Scent of a Woman” after voters were flown to New York for a Universal Pictures-sponsored boondoggle, he called the group “illegitimate” and described its practices as “an elaborate scheme.”

Still, until recent months, the Globes trundled on and even gained prominence, buoyed by a top-notch producer in Dick Clark Productions, which put together a TV broadcast “that could teach the Oscars lessons,” said Stephen Galloway, dean of Chapman University’s film school and a former executive editor of The Hollywood Reporter. The merging of no-holds-barred hosts, free-flowing drinks and the awarding of prizes to both film and television stars in a smallish ballroom where they often mingled between tables meant the show rarely disappointed.

“In some ways, the legitimacy of the show made up for the illegitimacy of the awards,” Mr. Galloway said.