Borat's Got Write Stuff
Borat's Oscar stock just ticked up. Again.
The controversial hit comedy, up for two Golden Globes next week, pulled in a Writers Guild of America nomination Thursday for Best Adapted Screenplay.
Last year, only two of the WGA's 10 feature-film nominees failed to nab a screenplay nod at the Academy Awards.
Borat's screenplay, credited to star Sacha Baron Cohen, Anthony Hines, Peter Baynham and Dan Mazer, will go page-to-page with The Departed, The Devil Wears Prada, Little Children and Thank You for Smoking.
In the Original Screenplay category, Peter Morgan's critically lauded effort for The Queen has a shot at yet another honor. His competition at the WGAs: the writers of Babel, Little Miss Sunshine, Stranger Than Fiction and United 93.
Notable in its absence: an adapted screenplay nomination for writer-director Bill Condon's reengineering of Dreamgirls.
Since Dreamgirls has already racked up key nominations from the Producers Guild and the Directors Guild, the WGA snub is not necessarily fatal to the musical's Best Picture hopes. Last year, Steven Spielberg's Munich got shut out by WGA voters en route to scoring Oscar nominations for Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay.
Clint Eastwood's Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima also were ignored by the writers' union, but given the films' lack of success of late, the WGA vote seems less like a snub and more like a trend.
Patrick Marber might be the most surprised snubee. On Monday, he'll be up for a Golden Globe for his screenplay for the wicked Notes on a Scandal. Come the WGA Awards, he'll be up for nothing.
Marber is the only Globe-nominated writer who failed to net a WGA nomination.
Numbers-wise, it's harder to get a screenplay nod from the Globes than the WGA. The Globes doesn't differentiate between original and adapted screenplays, meaning only five slots are typically available. The WGA, like the Oscars, usually has 10 slots available.
Borat's residency in one of the WGA slots might be surprising to filmgoers who thought Cohen made up his Kazakhstani shtick as he went along.
While the everyday people interviewed by Cohen's alter ego weren't scripted, the situations were plotted out—meticulously, according to one of the film's producers.
"Sacha's a real student of comedy, so he's incredibly thorough," Jay Roach said in the Los Angeles Times this week. "He never relies on his first or second idea. He wants to dig deeper. He wasn't really happy until he got to his 28th thought for a scene."
According to the WGA, Borat is considered an adapted screenplay because it's based on the journalist character Cohen created for his HBO series, Da Ali G Show. (Oscar voters are also considering Borat for the adapted screenplay category.)
The WGA Awards honors television as well as film. Among the previously announced TV nominees are: 24, Deadwood, Grey's Anatomy, Lost and The Sopranos, all up for Best Dramatic Series; and, 30 Rock, Arrested Development, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Entourage and The Office, all nominated for Best Comedy Series.
The 2007 Writers Guild Awards are scheduled to be presented Feb. 11 in Los Angeles and New York.
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