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Mark Wahlberg is a Roman Catholic who goes to church every day to pray to be a better servant of God, a better man.

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The Golden Globes Awards “are just like the Oscars but without all that esteem,” host Ricky Gervais said during last night’s Golden Globes telecast, his third stint hosting the annual show. The ceremony—featuring awards handed out by the Hollywood Foreign Press—includes some nice surprises as well as great disappointments.

Here’s a look at the big winners and losers of the evening.

Oscar Contenders

Winners: “The Artist” and The Descendants”
Both films are likely to be major Oscar contenders, and both left the Globes with renewed momentum. “The Artist” collected awards for best comedy or musical, best actor (Jean Dujardin) and best score. Meanwhile, “The Descendants” collected two awards: best actor in a drama (George Clooney) and best drama. Their wins likely foreshadow their future success at the Academy Awards and could lead to more moviegoers checking out these two smaller films.

Losers: “Moneyball” and “The Ides of March”
Despite the fact that it was nominated for four awards, “Moneyball” walked home with zero awards. Even Aaron Sorkin (“The Social Network”), Steve Zaillian (“Schindler’s List”) and Stan Chervin didn’t win for their brilliant screenplay. Woody Allen took home the award for best screenplay for his wonderful comedy, “Midnight in Paris.” “Ides of March,” the political thriller directed and co-written by George Clooney, also went 0-4 during the evening but Clooney didn’t leave the show empty-handed (see winners).

Acceptance Speeches:

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You’d think people who get paid to recite lines, hit their cues and say the right thing would do some, if not all, of the above during a gala ceremony honoring their peers.

Anyone who so much as channel surfed onto the 69th annual Golden Globes telecast last night spotted one bumble or another. Maybe more.

Meryl Streep dropped an “F” bomb during her acceptance speech for her work in “The Iron Lady.” Natalie Portman walked to the wrong podium. The teleprompter had a hiccup, leaving Rob Lowe to stare at the screen as if he had never ad libbed a second in his life. Johnny Depp looked like it was his first time speaking before a live audience.

“Modern Family” star Sofia Vergara had trouble with multiple names, but we’ll cut her some slack since one of them was “The Artist” director Michel Hazanavicius.

It’s a good thing Robert De Niro or Warren Beatty, two of the worst public speakers in Tinsel Town, weren’t in the building.

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It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Award show season is here, and it’s the time when I get all excited and giddy for the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild Awards, and the Academy Awards.

The 69th Annual Golden Globes starts at 8 p.m. EST tonight and will be hosted again by British comedian Ricky Gervais. I can’t wait to see who he offends this time.

Let’s take a look at who’s nominated this year for Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s Golden Globes. Favorites of the HFPA this year are “The Artist” and George Clooney. I’ve gone through the nominations and picked who I would like to see win and who will most likely win.

FILM

Best Motion Picture – Drama

The Descendants
The Help
Hugo
The Ides of March
Moneyball
War Horse

“The Help” was one of the most incredibly moving films of the year and featured a stellar, talented cast. It was also one of the best book adaptations I have ever seen. But I think the HFPA is in favor of Clooney this year. My Pick: The Help Who Will Win: The Descendants

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Ricky Gervais will not apologize for the jokes he’s planning to tell during this weekend’s Golden Globes telecast.

At least, that’s what he’s been explaining in one media interview after another to drum up interest for the show. Usually, the avowed athiest just does his shtick and gets out of the way.

Heck, if the folks behind the annual Globes telecast don’t want him back for another hosting assignment, so be it, he often says.

Lately, Gervais has been downright chatty in defending himself against charges that he’s far more cruel than funny. So, will this year’s event, to be broadcast 8 p.m. Sunday night on NBC, bring more of Gervais’s politically correct firepower – hitting addict celebrities, aging starlets and people of faith?

Can Gervais resist a Tebow crack?

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And you wonder why Apatow’s overlong, forgettable films are about as edgy as a baby’s pacifier.

Huffington Post:

While accepting the Critics’ Choice Award for Best Comedy film, “Bridesmaids” producer slammed Jerry Lewis for a sexist remark the legendary comedian once made.

“Jerry Lewis once said that he didn’t think women were funny, so I’d just like to say, with all respect, ‘F*ck you!’” Apatow exclaimed at the end of his speech to cheers from the audience.

Lewis made the comment in 1998 at the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen. He told an audience during a Q&A session that “I don’t like any women comedians” and “A woman doing comedy doesn’t offend me but sets me back a bit. I, as a viewer, have trouble with it. I think of her as a producing machine that brings babies in the world.”

With its all female leading cast headed up by co-writer Kristen Wiig, “Bridesmaids” scored critical raves, took in $288 million worldwide and is nominated for three Golden Globes. Though it seems silly to think that there were skeptics, its success proved to many in Hollywood that women can anchor successful broad comedies, not just the romantic comedies and “Sex and the City” films.

Jerry Lewis pushing ninety and this jerk is making his life miserable over a 14 year-old remark?

How ballsy.

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DHD:

Economist and writer and humorist and actor Ben Stein has filed suit against Kyoscera Corp and advertising agency Seiter & Miller alleging that an agreement for him to appear in TV commercials was illegally breached because of his personal and political beliefs about global warming. Stein’s memorable jacket-and-tie deadpan persona has figured in numerous TV commercials and appearances. Not to mention his iconic turn in the movie Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. According to Stein’s suit, Grace Jao of Seiter & Miller in December 2010 contacted his agent Marcia Hurwitz of Innovative Artists about appearing in commercials for Kyocera printer products and about speaking at a company function. Over the course of about five weeks, the suit claims, the parties reached an agreement on all significant deal points including payment of Stein’s fee of $300,000 for shooting the commercials and for the speaking engagement. The circumstances led Hurwitz to believe the deal was done, the suit says, and Stein planned accordingly.

Early in February 2011 Jao contacted Hurwitz, the suit says, to inform the agent that questions had been raised over Stein’s beliefs about global warming and the environment and whether they were “sufficiently conventional and politically correct for Kyocera,” according to language in the suit. Hurwitz told Jao that as far as she was concerned the deal was done, the suit said, and Stein’s political and scientific views were not part of his contract for extolling the company’s printers.

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Rapper Jay-Z took time out from defending the Occupy Wall Street movement to ply his new young daughter with the very best of the best.

What child doesn’t need a $20,000 crib?

That’s just the tip of the one-percent iceberg regarding the riches the rapper’s daughter received since her much-publicized debut.

Since entering the world of music royalty five days ago, 7-pound Blue Ivy Carter has collected a cache of presents from her parents and their celebrity pals, including media queen Oprah Winfrey.

The newborn’s superstar father plunked down $20,000 on a Posh Tots Carriage Fantasy Crib made of solid cedar and birch. A rear luggage rack doubles as a changing table.

And then there is the $285 Jean Paul Gaultier silk dress to burp on, sources told the Daily News….

The new parents have also been inundated with gifts from the likes of Sean (Diddy) Combs, Kanye West, Rihanna, Mary J. Blige and Mariah Carey, the source said.

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Meryl Streep doesn’t think President Barack Obama has a spine of steel like a certain British Prime Minister.

Then again, who could be a tough, decisive leader in these challenging times, Streep argues during a new interview with The Huffington Post.

Streep, all but guaranteed to pick up another Oscar nomination for her turn as Margaret Thatcher in “The Iron Lady,” served up a lengthy excuse for Obama when asked what the president could learn from Thatcher’s political career:

It was a completely different world. The Huffington Post didn’t exist. [Today] you have to respond to the YouTube clip going over and over of the thing you said that morning … I think, in a way, that clarity was possible, that conviction politics were possible in a way that maybe they’re not. You’d hope to think they are.

I’ve heard people in government lament that cameras are everywhere because you can’t make those deals, you can’t as a conservative member of your district make a deal with somebody on the the liberal side because you’re dead. It’s photographed, it’s seen. We don’t get those Lyndon Johnson solutions anymore.

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For years, actors have been essentially insulting half their potential audience by trashing the right in press interviews and talk show appearances.

Just ask Kate Beckinsale, who told Entertainment Weekly regarding the 2008 elections – “And I was so shocked to see people admitting to being Republican on their front lawn!”

Now, The Hollywood Reporter’s Heat Index feature suggests the reason Matt Damon’s “We Bought a Zoo” flopped was … wait for it … because Damon dared to critique President Barack Obama. [Link behind paywall]

The actor’s media slams of President Obama and ‘Bourne Identity’ writer Tony Gilroy probably didn’t help ‘We Bought a Zoo,’ which has disappointed at the box office.

When was the last time a major press outlet blamed the death of the movie star on said stars mocking the people who pay for movie tickets?

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Democrats rallied ’round Vice President Al Gore in 2000 even if Captain Global Warming was as dull as a power point presentation.

Now, looks like comedians are prepping the Dull Card to play against potential presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

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Tina Fey and Jimmy Fallon both played the card – hard – Tuesday during a skit on Fallon’s NBC “Late Night” program.

The bit involved a game show segment where the participants had to imitate famous people. For Michelle Obama, Fey started flexing her arms – Fey’s partner thought she was doing the Hulk. Ha ha.

When Fey drew Romney’s name, she said, “This is a really boring Republican guy who might be president.” Later, when the game required only visual clues, Fallon started moving stiffly, like a robot politician motioning to an unseen crowd.

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Refreshing interview with John Heder courtesy of Vulture:

Today:

Gervais, who has hosted the Globes for the past two years and will do so again on Sunday night, continued his chat from last week with TODAY’s Matt Lauer on Wednesday, refusing to apologize for being offensive from time to time.

“What am I doing? I’m coming up with jokes and annoying people,” he said. “I think offense is taken, not given. If you don’t let yourself be offended, you’re not offended. Some people are offended by quality; some people are offended by mixed marriage; some people are offended by homosexuality. What are we meant to do, stop all those things because someone’s offended? No.”

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OK, David Cross, we get it. You really, really wish you hadn’t signed on for “Alvin & the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked.”

Cross has been more than vocal about how much he hated both filming the new kiddie flick as well as the finished project. But when he sat down on the Team Coco couch last night, Cross found a new way to insult the film’s executive producer.

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“In all honesty it was the most miserable experience I’ve ever had in my professional life.” The star, who was raised Jewish but now identifies as an Atheist, then made a comment that could raise a firestorm — if he weren’t a comedian and crossing a line weren’t his job.

Complaining that he was forced “at legal gunpoint” to spend a week on a cruise ship to film scenes in which he is covered, head to toe, in a pelican mascot costume, Cross called the exec behind the awful ocean ride “The personification of what people think about when they think negatively about Jews.”

The Huffington Post’s account of the exchange tried to do some damage control on Cross’ behalf:

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When then-Sen. Barack Obama promised Hope and Change, what he really meant was, “gimme eight full years” for the full array of said hope and change.

So thinks Janelle Monae, the young soul singer gearing up for her first Obama fundraiser.

Monae, whose hits include, “Tightrope” and “Cold War,” is all too eager to line the coffers of the Obama war chest. After all, who can get anything done in a mere four years?

Monae will perform at a fundraiser for the president’s re-election in the Windy City on Wednesday. Explaining her support of Obama on her Facebook page, Monae wrote: “President Obama is not finished. Let. the. man. finish.”

What was David O. Russell thinking? After all, if you want to enhance your resume in Hollywood, you’re supposed to flee justice after you drug, rape and sodomize a thirteen year-old child. Sorry, David, but groping a nineteen year-old transsexual just isn’t going to cut it. However, now that I think about it, you might score some points over the incest element. So, well done in that department.

You have to read this to believe it. Only in Hollywood:

Sounds like David O. Russell truly is flirting with disaster.

According to a police report obtained by The Smoking Gun,  Russell’s transsexual, 19-year-old nephew, Nicholas Peloquin — the son of Russell’s adoptive sister, Barbara Jane Peloquin — alleges that “The Fighter” director inappropriately groped Peloquin during a super-awkward exchange at a Florida gym on Friday.

Somehow it gets better:

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The love between then-Sen. Barack Obama and the Hollywood elite was so deep Oscar winner Halle Berry proclaimed she would “collect paper cups off the ground to make his pathway clear.”

Director Spike Lee insisted history would be measured in two distinct times – “Before Barack and After Barack.”

For 2012, said love may be on the rocks. Why else would Obama dispatch a key lieutenant to mend the fences torn down by three years of his administration in action?

President Barack Obama’s top Hollywood fundraiser has resigned the ambassadorship to the Bahamas and returned to Los Angeles in the hopes of patching up the incumbent president’s battered relationship with the entertainment industry, The Hollywood Reporter has learned….

Sources told THR that Obama’s reelection campaign plans to use Avant as one of its top liaisons to the entertainment community.

These sources characterize the relationship between the Obama administration and Hollywood as tense and troubled, even though all of the president’s fundraisers in town have sold out and have been attended by a diverse array of industry leaders.

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It wasn’t long ago that Oprah Winfrey and Rosie O’Donnell represented two of the most beloved personalities on TV.

O’Donnell was the reigning Queen of Nice for her sweet as pie talk show, and Winfrey’s power was so vast she could hold up a book on camera and make it an instant best seller.

Then each decided to share their political views with their audiences after years of being mostly apolitical, and their careers haven’t been the same.

Winfrey wholeheartedly backed then-Sen. Barack Obama for the presidency in 2008. O’Donnell, freed from the constraints of her touchy, feely show, ranted her 9/11 truther conspiracies on “The View.”

Now, both are having trouble drawing a crowd on OWN, Winfrey’s much ballyhooed new network. Winfrey’s new talk show garnered only a fraction of the ratings her old talk show drew. And O’Donnell’s “The Rosie Show” isn’t faring any better.

Coincidence?

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Actor Mark Ruffalo really wants to alienate right-of-center movie goers from this Summer’s potential blockbuster, “The Avengers.”

Ruffalo, the far-left actor and activist, is now injecting political messages into the super-superhero film. The film, about a gaggle of comic book characters who unite against a common threat to Earth, should be the kind of box office no-brainer Hollywood craves.

Not if Ruffalo, cast as the Hulk’s alter ego, Bruce Banner, has something to say about it.

“You have all these disparate egos, superheroes in this and that, and they refuse to give up some of their positions in order to make a more perfect union and to join the team,” Ruffalo says.

“That’s really what the whole movie is about: subjugating your own best interest momentarily to further that of the whole,” he says.

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Kid Rock says he doesn’t mind if a politician on the left or the right wants to crank up his tunes on the campaign trail.

The shaggy crooner is the exception to the rule.

FoxNews.com reports that most singers balk when a Republican wants to co-op their songs for campaign events. Things are mighty different when it’s a Democratic politician singing a familiar song.

On the other hand, Bill Clinton used Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop” in his successful 1992 presidential bid, Democratic Sen. John F. Kerry played Springsteen’s “No Surrender” in his 2004 campaign, in 2008 Sen. Barack Obama revived Springsteen’s “The Rising,” and that same year fellow Democrat John Edwards used Mellancamp’s “Our Country.” All of these came and went without objection from the artists. In fact, except for 2008, when Barack Obama was sent a “cease and desist” letter from the legal team for Sam Moore (one half of the legendary duo Sam & Dave) over the unlicensed use of “Hold On, I’m Comin’” as background beat at his rallies, its hard to find examples of Democrats getting taken to task.