The Golden Globes are a hours away, and as Hollywood prepares to salute some of its biggest and brightest in film and television, the color barrier is still in clear view. For more than 70 years, several Black actors and actresses have been nominated for Globes, but only a small bunch have actually made it to the winner’s circle.
Furthermore, no Black director, or screenwriter has ever won a Golden Globe in the history of the ceremony.
So what gives? Unfortunately only a certain caliber of performances tend to grab the attention of the Hollywood Foreign Press. Award winners are typically  playing some other well-known figure (battling inner demons, addiction,  or anything else terrible),  a down-and-out character (preferably one getting abused or abusing others), a boxer, a slave, or “the help.” At this point it’s pretty clear that if an actor wants to walk home with a Globe for a movie role, they must participate in a project that contributes to a stereotype, or rehash a historical time period — typically between slavery and the Civil Rights Movement.
The unwritten guidelines for Black actors to win big during awards season meets with deviation once in a while. Every so often a Black person will win for less-demeaning film gigs, or maybe a song.
This year, four black actors and one director grabbed nods in major categories. Idris Elba is up for the Best Actor in a Motion Picture or Drama for Long Walk to Freedom, a biopic on the late Nelson Mandela. Also in the Best Actor race is 12 Years A Slave actor Chiwetel Ejiofor for playing Solomon Northup, a man born free, only to be sold into slavery. His co-star Lupita Nyong’o is up for Best Actress in a Supporting role, and the film’s director Steven McQueen could walk away with the Best Director trophy. Another Black nominee in this year is Barkhad Abdi who plays a Somali pirate in the Tom Hanks-led flick Captain Phillips.
Although The Butler (yet another story hinged on Black servitude)Â was shut out this year, there’s clearly a pattern here, one that has gotten more and more obvious over the years.
Hit the gallery below to see the list of Black actors and actresses to win Golden Globes for performances on the silver screen.
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Photos: IMDB/Pinterest/Facebook/TVGuide/Touchstone/Warner Bros.
1964, Sydney PortierÂ
20 years after the first Golden Globes ceremony was held, Sydney Portier wins Best Actor in a Motion Picture Drama for Lilies of the Field. He played a  wandering worker who builds a church for a group of German nuns. He  would go on to receive four additional Best Actor nominations.
1971, James Earl Jones
Mr. Jones wins Most Promising Male Newcomer for playing a boxer in The Great White Hope.
1972, Isaac HayesÂ
Isaac Hayes wins Best Original Score for Shaft.
1973, Diana RossÂ
Diana Ross won Most Promising Female Newcomer  for Lady Sings the Blues. She played the late Billie Holiday.
1983, Louis Gossett Jr.
Louis Gossett Jr. nabs a Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture for An Officer and A Gentleman.
1984, Irene Cara
Singer/actress Irene Cara wins the Best Original Song Golden Globe for “Flashdance, What A Feeling.”
1985, Stevie WonderÂ
Stevie Wonder’s “I Just Called to Say I Love You” earns Best Original Song.
1986, Lionel RichieÂ
Lionel Richie wins Best Original Song for “Say You, Say Me,” from the film White Nights.
1986, Whoopi GoldbergÂ
Whoopi Goldberg wins Best Actress for The Color Purple. She is the only Black actress to ever win this category.
1990, Denzel WashingtonÂ
Denzel Washington grabs the Best Supporting Actor in a Drama award for Glory.
1990, Morgan FreemanÂ
Driving Miss Daisy earned Morgan Freeman the Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy, where he played a widowed White woman’s driver.
1991, Whoopi GoldbergÂ
Whoopi Goldberg earned the Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture globe for playing an outspoken,  quirky  medium in Ghost.
1994, Angela BassettÂ
Angela Bassett was honored with a Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy Globe for playing Tina Turner in What’s Love Got to Do With It.
2000, Denzel Washington
More than three decades after Sydney Portier’s win, Denzel Washington became the second Black actor to be victorious in a leading dramatic film category for his role as a boxer wrongfully-convicted of rape and murder in The Hurricane.
2005, Jamie FoxxÂ
Depicting the life and times of Ray Charles helped Jamie Foxx grab the Globe for Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical.
2007, Forrest WhitakerÂ
Whitaker won Best Actor for The Last King of Scotland where he played African dictator Idi Amin.
2007, Jennifer Hudson
In her first movie role Jennifer Hudson took home the Best Supporting Actress award for playing Effie White in Dreamgirls. The character was a singer in a girl group who breaks free from her click, bears the child of her manager, and becomes an alcoholic… all before she pulls her life back together.
2007, Eddie Murphy
Eddie Murphy wins Best Supporting Actor for his roll in Dreamgirls as drug-addicted womanizing singer, Jimmy “Thunder” Early.
2007, Prince
The Purple One snatched up the Best Original song award for “The Song of the Heart” from Happy Feet.
2010, Mo’Nique
Four years ago Precious was the talk of the film world. The depiction of a struggling Black teen living in New York City with a sexually, physically, and verbally abusive mother, played by Mo’Nique, won the comedian Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture.
2012, Octavia Spencer
Even though the story has been told about a million times over, Octavia Spencer won a Best Supporting Actress award for playing a maid in The Help. Go figure.
