The Hollywood Foreign Press Association announced its nominations for the 2021 Golden Globe Awards this morning, and 21 book-based movie and TV productions were among the nominees.
Nomadland, a dramatic film based on Jessica Bruder’s Kirkus-starred 2017 nonfiction book, Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century, received four nominations: Best Picture – Drama, Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama for Frances McDormand, and Best Director and Best Screenplay for a theatrical film for Chloé Zhao. (The movie received five Film Independent Spirit Award nominations last week.)
The Undoing, the HBO miniseries based on the Jean Hanff Korelitz’s 2014 novel, You Should Have Known, was also nominated for four Golden Globes, including Best Television Motion Picture; stars Nicole Kidman, Hugh Grant, and Donald Sutherland are all in the running for acting awards.
The Netflix series Ratched, a prequel to Ken Kesey’s 1961 novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, is up for three awards, including Best Drama Series. Sarah Paulson, who played the title character of Nurse Ratched, and Cynthia Nixon received acting nods.
Anya Taylor-Joy was nominated for two awards for her starring roles in last year’s film adaptation of the Jane Austen classic Emma and the Netflix miniseries The Queen’s Gambit, which was based on Walter Tevis’ 1983 novel; the latter show also received a nomination for Best Television Motion Picture.
Jodie Comer received her second consecutive Golden Globe nomination for playing Russian assassin Villanelle in the AMC show Killing Eve, which is based on a series of spy thrillers by Luke Jennings. She lost the award last year to The Crown’s Olivia Colman.
Several other book-based productions received two nominations each, including the film News of the World, based on the offbeat, Kirkus-starred Western by Paulette Jiles; the Hulu miniseries version of Normal People, Sally Rooney’s Kirkus-starred novel; the Disney+ film of the smash musical Hamilton, which was inspired by Ron Chernow’s Kirkus-starred 2004 biography, Alexander Hamilton; The Mauritanian, a movie based on Mohamedou Ould Slahi’s 2015 prison memoir, Guantánamo Diary; Unorthodox, a Netflix miniseries based on Deborah Feldman’s 2012 nonfiction book, Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots; the HBO Max miniseries of Chris Bohjalian’s 2018 mystery, The Flight Attendant; the Italian Netflix film The Life Ahead, based on Romain Gary’s 1975 novel The Life Before Us; and The Comey Rule, a Showtime miniseries adaptation of former FBI director James Comey’s bestselling 2018 memoir, A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership.
Eight more adaptations received single nominations, including the Showtime miniseries The Good Lord Bird; the HBO productions I Know This Much Is True, Lovecraft Country, and Perry Mason; the Netflix film Hillbilly Elegy; the movie The Personal History of David Copperfield; and the upcoming film French Exit, which set for a theatrical release on Feb. 12.
The Golden Globes ceremony will air on NBC on Feb. 28.
David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.
