The Golden Raspberry Awards (also known as the Razzies and Razzie Awards) is a parody award show honoring the worst of cinematic failures. Co-founded by UCLA film graduates and film industry veterans John J. B. Wilson and Mo Murphy, the Razzie Awards' satirical annual ceremony is preceded by its opposite, the Academy Awards, by four decades. The term raspberry is used in its irreverent sense, as in "blowing a raspberry". The statuette is a golf ball-sized raspberry atop a Super 8mm film reel atop a 35-millimeter film core with brown wood shelf paper glued and wrapped around it—sitting atop a jar lid spray-painted gold. The Golden Raspberry Foundation has claimed that the award "encourages well-known filmmakers and top-notch performers to own their bad."
The first Golden Raspberry Awards ceremony was held on March 31, 1981, in John J. B. Wilson's living-room alcove in Hollywood, to honor the perceived worst films of the 1980 film season. To date, Sylvester Stallone is the most awarded actor ever with 12 awards.
American publicistJohn J. B. Wilson had been seeing a 99-cent double feature of Can't Stop the Music and Xanadu and thought in his drive home that those movies deserved awards for their low quality, and subsequently started thinking of all the other films that disappointed him in 1980, particularly as he had watched hundreds of productions in his job making trailers.[1][2] So, the following year, in the potluck parties he usually held at his home in Hollywood on the night of the Academy Awards,[3] after the 53rd Academy Awards had completed for the evening, Wilson passed ballots regarding the worst in film to the attendees, and invited his friends to give random award presentations in his living room.[3][4][1] Wilson stood at a lectern made of cardboard in a tacky tuxedo, with a foam ball attached to a broomstick as a fake microphone, and announced Can't Stop the Music as the first Golden Raspberry Award Winner for Worst Picture.[1][5] The impromptu ceremony was a success and the following week a press release about his event was picked up by a few local newspapers, including a mention in the Los Angeles Daily News with the headline: "Take These Envelopes, Please".[3][4][5]
Approximately three dozen people came to the 1st Golden Raspberry Awards.[5] The 2nd Golden Raspberry Awards had double the attendance, and the 3rd awards ceremony had doubled that number.[5] By the 4th Golden Raspberry Awards ceremony, CNN and two major wire services covered the event.[3] Wilson realized that by scheduling the Golden Raspberry Awards prior to the Academy Awards, the ceremony would get more press coverage: "We finally figured out you couldn't compete with the Oscars on Oscar night, but if you went the night before, when the press from all over the world are here and they are looking for something to do, it could well catch on," he said to BBC News.[3]
In 2022, a dedicated award category, Worst Bruce Willis Performance in a 2021 Movie, was created after Bruce Willis starred in a number of poorly received low-budget films. On March 30 of that year, Willis's family announced that he had been diagnosed with aphasia.[6] The Golden Raspberry Awards subsequently retracted the award category, saying it was inappropriate to award a Golden Raspberry to someone whose performance was affected by a medical condition.[7] At the same time, the Awards retroactively retracted their 1980 Worst Actress nomination of Shelley DuvallinThe Shining, stating "We have since discovered that Duvall's performance was impacted by Stanley Kubrick's treatment of her throughout the production".[8] In 2023, following backlash for nominating 12-year-old Ryan Kiera Armstrong for Worst Actress, the Golden Raspberry Awards rescinded the nomination and said individuals under age 18 would no longer be nominated.[9] The Razzies themselves later won the category for the blunder.[10]
Members of the Golden Raspberry Award Organization pay for membership, and number 650 from 19 countries.[11][12] After three editions held during Wilson's potluck Oscar parties, Wilson realized that by scheduling the Golden Raspberry Awards prior to the Academy Awards, the ceremony would get more press coverage, and the fourth edition happened at Los Angeles' Third Street Elementary School.[3] The ceremonies have generally been scheduled in this way, with both nominations and awards revealed in the day before the Academy Awards, ever since, with only two exceptions. 2012's 32nd Golden Raspberry Awards, had the nominees announced the day before the academy award nominees, but the ceremony took place on April 1, April Fool's Day.[13] In 2020, there were plans for the milestone 40th Golden Raspberry Awards to be celebrated with a bigger, televised ceremony in March, but the ceremonies were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the winners revealed online.[14][15]
Several people and/or films have received Razzie nominations while simultaneously receiving award nominations and other cultural honors from different organizations, sometimes for the same work or role.
Every decade-closing ceremony includes an award for the worst actors and movies of the decade—though the 2000 ceremony put the actors as worst of the 20th century instead. Special prizes for the 25th anniversary of the Razzies awards were also given out in 2005.
This award has been given five times, to Ronald Reagan in 1981, to Linda Blair in 1983, to Irwin Allen in 1985, to "Bruce the Rubber Shark" from Jaws[25] in 1987, and to director Uwe Boll[26] in 2009 who received this for his achievement as "Germany's answer to Ed Wood".
This is a special award given by Razzie Award Governor John J. B. Wilson to an individual whose achievements are not covered by the Razzies' other categories. It was awarded in 2003 to Travis Payne for "Distinguished Under-Achievement in Choreography" in the film From Justin to Kelly.[27] It would again be awarded in 2021 to the year 2020 for "The Worst Calendar Year EVER!"[28][29][30]
The Razzies have received criticism, including from news sources such as IndieWire[34] and The Daily Telegraph,[35] for several issues, including that members of the Golden Raspberry Foundation are not required to watch the nominated films.[34] The awards follow a different set of rules[34] from the invitation-only Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.[36][37] Critics take issue with the Razzies picking "easy targets" and critically panned mainstream films instead of those perceived as less popular but more deserving of notice,[38] and continuing to appeal to celebrities, seemingly for publicity and attention.[34]
Sam Adams of IndieWire has said the Razzies are "like hecklers hurling insults at comedians or a concertgoer yelling out 'Whoo!' during a quiet song, they're not-so-secretly crying out to be noticed. The Razzies, properly enough, avoid pouncing on the little guy; they don't trash no-budget indies no one has seen for having bad lighting or terrible sound".[34] Robbie Collin of The Daily Telegraph wrote, however, that "the Razzies' ongoing failure to train its sights on anything but the most obvious targets means it grows more tired and redundant by the year".[35]CraveOnline's William Bibbiani stated that the Razzies follow "a cheap shot of pranksterism", and "with only a handful of exceptions, the Razzies have only seen fit to nominate the most infamous movies of the year, and not necessarily the worst."[38] In 2018, Scott Meslow, writing for GQ, accused the Razzies of being "pretty lazy, very sexist, and a little racist" in their choices, reiterating criticism that voters were overreliant on films already widely perceived as notorious, and further asserting they disproportionally nominated films directed by and starring Tyler Perry and films marketed towards women.[39]
In 2021, Liam Gaughan of the Dallas Observer wrote, "It’s easy to find fault in any awards nominations, be it Oscars or Razzies, but the greater issue that the Razzies face is that making fun of bad movies is no longer original. Film criticism, essays and satire all live in abundance on the internet, from both established publications and non-professionals."[37] Daniel Cook Johnson of MovieWeb echoed a similar sentiment, writing, "Wilson and Murphy’s insulting event may have been a wonderfully snarky and skewering enterprise back in the ‘80s when there was much less film criticism and audience reactions to recent movies. But now, there’s little reason for such an invalid vehicle, and the retirement option should be recognized before their relevance and shaky reputation are completely gone."[40]
^ abLarsen, Peter (January 20, 2005). "The Morning Read – So bad, they're almost good – A love of movies lies behind the Razzies". The Orange County Register. p. 1.
^ abcdMarder, Jenny (February 26, 2005). "Razzin' The Dregs of Hollywood Dreck – Film: Cerritos' John Wilson Marks His Golden Raspberry Awards' 25th Year With A Guide To Cinematic Slumming". Long Beach Press-Telegram. p. A1.
^"How to Become a Member". Oscars.org – Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. July 18, 2014. Archived from the original on January 6, 2015. Retrieved January 5, 2015.
