This Week in Gossip (January 11)

The Critics Choice Awards Made Good Choices, But Not With the Ceremony

The Critics’ Choice Awards kicked off the 2026 awards season in style. Shout out to whoever decided to ensure that the ceremony took place a week ahead of the Golden Globes. If we must have any awards ceremony be called the first precursor of the season, then I’ll take the CCAs over the payola special.

Overall, their picks across film and TV were both pretty solid, with a couple of surprises. Nobody’s shocked to see One Battle After Another emerge as the Best Picture frontrunner. Timothee Chalamet winning Best Actor may have been a bit unexpected but that race is still open (also, he’s been with Kylie for three years?! What is time?) How cool to see two horror performances – Jacob Elordi in Frankenstein and Amy Madigan in Weapons – be celebrated. Still, there are few locks at this time, and that’s the way we like it. Here’s how Wagner Moura can still win!

But there’s one big mess that the CCAs really need to deal with. A ton of their awards were not televised. Indeed, they weren’t even included in the ceremony. Winners were interviewed on the red carpet, then handed an award with no real glitz or respect, and they couldn’t even give a quick speech in gratitude.

It’s so disrespectful and tacky to be this flagrant in your disrespect for the winners of your own awards. Oh hey, we don’t think you’re famous or interesting enough for the televised ceremony, so here’s your statue, now go away. At least when the BAFTAs shove their tech winners into an also-ran at the end of the show (which still sucks, don’t get me wrong), they got a chance to be on stage and give a proper speech. How could you think that people wouldn’t want to see Ryan Coogler of all people get his Original Screenplay trophy, or the tech and international award categories?

The thing about televised awards ceremonies is that networks are utterly convinced that the people who watch them hate awards shows. They’re determined to cut down every speech or moment of victory for these people, even the wildly famous ones, so that they can fill the next few hours with musical numbers and bad comedic skits. Who are these people who watch, say, the BAFTAs and want to see Cirque du Soliel performances rather than the films they love being celebrated? It baffles me, and yet we see this happen every dang year. Oh, the show’s running too long, you say? Who cares?! It happens once a year and all the awards-obsessed weirdos like me are locked in. Let it run long!

Networks are still acting like we’ll return to the heyday of 50 million+ viewers for these events, and we’re so beyond that. You’re competing with 300 channels, several streaming services, YouTube, TikTok, and Fortnite. Appreciate the built-in viewership these ceremonies have and stop treating them like they’re idiots.

Okay, Fine, Let’s Talk About Ashley Tisdale and the Mummy Group Drama

Ashley Tisdale, once of High School Musical fame, is now Ashley French. She wrote a piece on her blog that was then expanded for The Cut about her experiences with a “toxic mom group” and how she decided to cut herself out of this clique. She had spoken before about having support from “a village of moms” following the birth of her daughter, Jupiter, in 2021. But now, she’s saying that the group turned nasty, with high school-esque dynamics that left her feeling “frozen out.” She added: “To be clear, I have never considered the moms to be bad people (maybe one), but I do think our group dynamic stopped being healthy and positive - for me anyway.”