"The Descendants" and "Midnight in Paris" took home the top film awards from the Writers Guild of America on Sunday night.
Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash won for their adapted screenplay to "The Descendants," while Woody Allen was honored for his original screenplay for "Midnight in Paris." Both are among the favorites for the screenwriting awards at next weekend's Academy Awards.
(Left: Faxon, Payne and Rash accepting their awards; photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images)
In the television categories, "Modern Family" and "Breaking Bad" were named best comedy and drama series, respectively.
"Homeland" was named best new series, beating out "Episodes," "Game of Thrones," The Killing" and "New Girl," the last of which stars the WGA Awards show's co-host, Zooey Deschanel. (Joel McHale hosted with her.)
Winners in the long-form TV categories, which had only two nominees each, were the HBO shows "Too Big to Fail" for adapted, and "Cinema Verite" for original.
Other awards went to "The Colbert Report," Jimmy Kimmel's "After the Academy Awards" special and the "Homer the Father" episode of "The Simpsons," which had four of the six nominees in the TV animation category.
When "General Hospital" won in the daytime drama category, Karen Harris pointed out that for the second year in a row, ABC had decided not to buy WGA Awards tickets for its nominated daytime writers.
While both "The Descendants" and "Midnight in Paris" reinforced their position as strong contenders or even favorites for the Academy Awards' writing honors, a number of Oscar-nominated films were not eligible for the WGA Awards. Guild rules restrict eligible screenplays to those written under the guild's Minimum Basic Agreement, or under similar agreements from one of five affiliated international guilds.
Of the five nominees for original screenplay, only "Bridesmaids" and "Midnight in Paris" also received Oscar nominations. The WGA also went for "50/50," "Win Win" and "Young Adult" in the category. The Academy's Writers Branch opted for "The Artist," "Margin Call" and "A Separation," none of which were eligible under WGA rules.
In the Adapted Screenplay category, the WGA and Academy matched on three out of five: "The Descendants," "Hugo" and "Moneyball." The WGA rounded out the field with "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" and "The Help," while the Academy went for "The Ides of March" and "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy," the latter of which was ineligible.
The WGA win completed a very good weekend for "The Descendants," which had been largely bypassed in awards season since it was named Best Motion Picture, Drama at the Golden Globes. On Saturday, it won the Scripter Award for the best adaptation, and the ACE Eddie Award for the best edited dramatic film.
The WGA, West held its awards show at the same time as the WGA, East.
