Ricky Gervais Fires Shots At Cats And More In Golden Globes 2020 Monologue

With host Ricky Gervais at the helm of the 2020 Golden Globes, audiences probably had certain expectations for the often offensive and shocking comedian. He certainly delivered, but not in the way that many may have anticipated.

Right off the bat, Gervais told the audience that not only did he not care about the evening, but he's never cared very much during any of his hosting gigs. With a beer in tow, the abrasive Brit took Hollywood to task in a relatively laid-back way, firing shots at Cats and environmental activism and even diversity in film.

In his fifth hosting gig, he took the stage on the Globes without any pomp or circumstance — and it's easy to understand why. In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Gervais said, "Kevin Hart [lost] his job [as Oscars host] for 10-year-old tweets that he said he was sorry about and deleted at the time. So there's more pressure on making [the jokes bulletproof]. It's the world [watching]. This isn't me in a comedy club."

As expected, Gervais took aim at Hollywood's hypocrisy and excess during his 2020 Golden Globes opening monologue. After noting that his job was safe because "the Hollywood Foreign Press have no idea what Twitter is," he continued, "Let's go off with a bang... we're all going to die soon, and there's no sequel!" Before long, Gervais was skewering the celebrities involved with the recent college admissions scandal. After saying that everyone at the Golden Globes arrived in a limousine, he said he did the same, noting, "I came here in a limo tonight and the license plate was made by Felicity Huffman."

In terms of diversity, Gervais took plenty of shots at the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, saying, "Many talented people of color were snubbed... there's nothing we can do about that. The Hollywood Foreign Press are very racist." Gervais then pointed out the crowd's hypocrisy when it comes to humanitarian issues — "if ISIS started a streaming service, you'd call your agent," he snarked — and said most of the audience had probably spent less time in school than the teenage climate change activist Greta Thunberg, who was recently named TIME's Person of the Year.

Director Tom Hooper's Cats, the largely disastrous silver-screen adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber's stage play of the same name, has been on the receiving end of harsh jokes and intense criticism since its release in December 2019. And at the 2020 Golden Globes, it was an easy target for which to throw many, many darts. Gervais took advantage of the opportunity to roast Cats in his monologue.

"No one saw that," he said of the film. "And the reviews — shocking. I saw one that said, 'This is the worst thing to happen to cats since dogs."

Gervais also poked more than a bit of fun at two of the movie's stars — James Corden, who plays Bustopher Jones, and Dame Judi Dench, who portrays Old Deuteronomy. The comedian called the former a "fat p*****," and made some seriously not-safe-for-life comments about why latter was "born to play" an ancient feline.

Despite delivering some biting comments, Gervais seemed relatively checked out during his monologue, beginning the proceedings with a fairly lackluster start that, luckily, didn't affect the buoyant feeling of the rest of the evening.