It’s award show season, again. With The Grammys, The Oscars, Screen Actors Guild Awards and every award in-between, it is starting to get old watching celebrities win award after award. That begs the question, why are there so many different awards shows and why do we watch them?
Do we watch the awards to hear the hosts make us laugh or do we watch the awards to see celebrities thank people that we don’t know? There has to be a reason that there are greater than 10 awards shows.
The people getting these awards are winning for doing their job. They pick the best performer in one category and give them a trophy. It’s congratulating them on doing a good job. I’m not discounting the careers of the award winners. I believe that it is difficult to be an actor or performer and it takes serious skills to win one of the awards. But do we really have to watch Meryl Streep give five thank you speeches a year for the same movie?
Every award show is the same thing. The name is called, the winner makes a surprise face and talks about how shocked they are to win. Then they go thank people that the audiences don’t know. The only thing that is different in each award show is the host. And, really, are the hosts any different? Sure, they all have different personalities but they’re all telling the same jokes. They’re making fun of the same people.
Then, after the awards, there are debates on who was snubbed or who was robbed of the crown. The audience discusses what the celebrities wore and pick who looked the best. There is even an award for looking the best at an award show. Not only does it objectify those who go to the awards shows but it also makes the awards lose meaning.
With so many awards shows, it makes it less impressive when a person wins an award. It becomes more about the number of trophies on the wall and less about the quality of the award. And who is to say that getting a Golden Globe is more important than getting a SAG award. It is cheating the performers out of seeming special.
Compare performers to professional football players. There is one Superbowl a year. With this titles only being awarded once, it makes it more impressive to win. If there were a Superbowl, a People’s Superbowl, Hall of Fame Game and any other titles, it wouldn’t be as special to win that Superbowl ring.
So what can we do about this abundance of award shows? Complaining and writing opinions articles won’t do the trick. At this point, the award shows can’t be cancelled or combined. My suggestion is to spread the award shows apart. Instead of having every weekend in January and February be filled with awards shows, do one once a month. Or maybe only have an award show once every two years.
Winning an award should be special and with Hollywood riddled with award shows, it has become less about talent and more about a popularity contest.