2010 Writers Guild Awards

The 2010 Writers Guild Awards were held simultaneously on Saturday night at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles and the Hudson Theatre at the Millennium Broadway Hotel in New York City.  The  WGA  ceremony outcome, in this unending Awards Season,  saw no big surprises and  another feather in THE HURT LOCKER’s cap. Does this, combined with all the other precursor awards (PGA, DGA, ACE, ADG), add up a Best Picture win on March 7th at the Academy Awards? With two weeks go, it would seem so, but  I can’t help but sense a huge upset in the making.

The big WGA winners were:

• Best Original Screenplay Award: Mark Boal – THE HURT LOCKER

Boal said,

“I’m honored and stunned,” and “to Kathryn Bigelow for backing an unpopular story about an unpopular war. I want to thank the soldiers in Baghdad who I was embedded with….”

Best Adapted Screenplay Award: Sheldon Turner and Jason Reitman – UP IN THE AIR (Based upon the novel by Walter Kirn.)

Turner accepted by saying,

We don’t write because we want to, we write because we HAVE TO.

Jason Reitman mentioned that his father, producer/director Ivan Reitman, told him “You got the goods ” and finished with,

I’m a writer when I’m writing. I’m a writer when I’m directing. I’m a writer when I’m editing.

BEST DOCUMENTARY SCREENPLAY Award: Mark Monroe – THE COVE

Additional awards:

• Longform Adapted-TV Award went to TAKING CHANCE (HBO)
• Longform Original-TV Award went to GEORGIA O’KEEFE (Lifetime)
• Carl Gottlieb (JAWS) received the Morgan Cox Award for longtime service to the WGA.
• Jason Alexander presented the WGA Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award to Larry David.
• The WGA Paul Selvin Award went to Anthony Peckham – INVICTUS
• Billy Crystal presented the WGA Laurel Award for the Screen  to Barry Levinson.

Click here for a complete list of all the winners.

Thanks to Steve Pond (The ODDS/The Wrap), Anne Thompson (Thompson on Hollywood/indieWIRE), and Joshua Stecker (ScriptMag) for the results on Twitter.