2010 Golden Globe Predictions: Best Actor – Comedy or Musical
George Clooney, Up in the Air (with director Jason Reitman)
A professional downsizer finds his ideal frequent-flying partner right when he's about to get grounded.
An Austrian fashionista wants to become the next red-white-and-blue sensation.
Matt Damon, The Informant!
A pathological liar helps the FBI nab a law-breaking agribusiness conglomerate.
Daniel Day-Lewis, Nine
In this musicalized remake of Federico Fellini’s 8 1/2, Daniel Day-Lewis plays the old Marcello Mastroianni role of an Italian film director at odds with the women in his life.
Ryan Reynolds, The Proposal (with Sandra Bullock)
A Canadian businesswoman's assistant is coerced into marrying her lest she be deported from the US.
Ryan Reynolds? Sacha Baron Cohen? Well, they're both names (and Baron Cohen, at least, got some excellent reviews), so I'd place them ahead of, say, Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the sleeper hit (500) Days of Summer, Tom Hollander in In the Loop, or Michael Stuhlbarg in A Serious Man.
A couple of other possible nominees for the Best Actor – Comedy or Musical Golden Globe are Clive Owen in The Boys Are Back and Christopher Plummer in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (not exactly a comedy, but…).
Alec Baldwin (above, with Meryl Streep) and Steve Martin also have a chance, depending on how the Hollywood Foreign Press Association sees their status in It's Complicated. In other words, either one of them (or both) may end up in the best supporting actor category, where they'd have a better chance of landing a nomination considering the relative paucity of acclaimed supporting male performances so far this year.
Less likely Golden Globe possibilities are Gerard Butler, The Ugly Truth; Woody Harrelson, Zombieland; Paul Rudd, I Love You, Man; and Larry David, Whatever Works.
Zac Efron (above) in Me and Orson Welles (but not 17 Again) and Hugh Grant in Did You Hear About the Morgans? are wild cards. But despite their popularity, I wouldn't bet on either one.
And finally, I don't believe that Steve Martin (for The Pink Panther 2), Michael Moore (Capitalism: A Love Story), Kevin James (Paul Blart: Mall Cop), Ben Stiller (Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian), Bradley Cooper (The Hangover & All About Steve), Tyler Perry (Madea Goes to Jail), Matthew McConaughey (Ghosts of Girlfriends Past), Vince Vaughn (Couples Retreat), and — most hilarious of all — John Cusack (2012) have much of a chance. But don't lose heart: they may all show up as presenters.
