Episode Review: The Studio 1x8 - "The Golden Globes"

Welcome back to the blog readers. In case it has not been clear to you guys over the last six weeks, The Studio (2025-) has turned out to be one of my favorite shows airing right now. Its blend of cringe comedy and satire for the business of Hollywood is so addictive, it feels like fucking crack. I even love how we recently got the news that this show is getting picked up for a second season so it is not over in two weeks. Would this third-to-last episode, titled "The Golden Globes," written by Alex Gregory, and directed by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, be able to keep us going on this high? Stick around to find out.

NOTE: I will be using spoilers for my thoughts, so DO NOT read ahead if you have not seen the episode.

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Here's the thing readers. If you remember my post trashing the Golden Globes a few months back for putting The Substance (2024) in the Musical or Comedy section, you would know that I do not think the award ceremony is legitimate. So seeing a whole episode centered around the ceremony made me a little worried. In the first five minutes my worries were dashed because this may just be the best episode of the show so far. Matt is at his lowest and most desperate, and I love the story we are getting this week.

First off I need to praise the performance of Seth Rogen as our favorite studio executive Matt Remick. What Rogen has been able to do with this character has been nothing short of shocking to me. He has successfully blended his signature mannerisms (and we all know what they are) with an endearing, yet dimwitted at times, character that we can get behind despite him making us uncomfortable. In this episode, he takes that blend and increases it tenfold as he makes us possibly the most uncomfortable he has ever made us feel. But the performance is still as endearing and you really hope that Zoë Kravitz will thank him. This may just be the episode that gets Rogen a Best Actor in a Comedy Series nomination.

I next want to talk about the performance of Zoë Kravitz as...well, herself. As the daughter of music legend Lenny Kravitz, Zoë is a decorated actor who has been in a number of celebrated projects like The Batman (2022), the Divergent series (2014-16), and will show up in the new Aronofsky film Caught Stealing (2025). She also made her directorial debut with her film Blink Twice (2024) that you can read my mixed review of here. But this episode gave me a brand new side to her that I never thought we could see from her: deception. She is able to play the characters and the audience to a tee with her turn in the middle of the episode, and I was in hook, line and sinker. I love Kravitz as an actor and I hope she gets some really good material in Caught Stealing to work with.

Now we have to talk about the story of this episode, because this is the most desperate I have ever seen Matt and it gets Scott's Tots-levels of uncomfortable. We start at the Golden Globes, and Matt, Sal, and Patty are in attendance for her producing Zoë Kravitz's latest film Open that is nominated in the Best Musical or Comedy category. Matt's mother (voiced by Rhea Perlman) calls and already believes he will thank her when he goes up to get an award and has scheduled a watch party for all her friends to hear her name. Matt tells her he was not listed as a producer on the film and she expects for Kravitz to thank him. He is also worried that Kravitz, who is acting nonchalantly about winning to the press, will not thank him for greenlighting the film in her acceptance speech. Patty, who is listed as a producer on the film, expresses her wish to win for all that she has been through. Matt expresses that he is confident they will win. The ceremony goes off without a hitch, and Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos finds himself being thanked by everybody, later revealing to Matt that it is contractually obligated winners thank him.

Sal runs into Adam Scott, who was an old friend of his, and they reflect on Scott crashing on Sal's couch when he first arrived to Hollywood, and Scott later shouts him out in his acceptance speech when he wins an award. Sal becomes the star of the night when host Ramy Youssef messes around and people like Quinta Brunson, Jean Smart, and Aaron Sorkin all shout him out in their speeches as well. Meanwhile, Matt expresses his fear of not being thanked to Patty and expresses a wish to talk to Kravitz, something she forbids him to do. However, when Patty steps away, Matt does ask Kravitz how she will go about it, and she tells him who she plans on thanking. Matt watches Sal get shouted out by everyone and begins to get upset. In a last ditch effort, he goes to the person in charge of the teleprompter and tries to get him to add his name to her speech but is caught by her, who went to him to check her speech for the award she is presenting.

When Kravitz confronts Matt, she drops the act and tells him not only does she expect to win, she is putting on an act for the press and does not plan on altering her meticulously planned speech for anyone, even though he expressed his mother's wish. She also threatens to pull her newest film Blackwing from Continental as frustration where Matt finds out through her agent Mitch. Matt tries to negotiate first cut negotiation to keep her on. Matt, feeling deflated, later watches as Open wins and Kravitz does her speech as planned. She amends the end of her speech to thank Matt out of pity but she is played off before she can say his name. While everybody at "Team Open" celebrates, Matt gets an angry phone call from his mother where he assures her he tried his best. Zravitz and Mitch then approach Matt and tell him that she has agreed to keep Blackwing at Continental, making him a bit happier as he gets in his limo to go home still deflated.

The Studio takes a celebrated ceremony (by some) and makes it as uncomfortable (in the best way) as possible with insane character decisions. Thank you all for reading, and I will see you for the next post.