'The Hours,' 'Chicago,' 'The Shield' have golden touch

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- The sultry jazz musical "Chicago" won the Golden Globe for best musical-comedy Sunday while "The Hours" was honored as best film drama.

Dramatic performance honors went to Jack Nicholson for playing a depressed retiree in "About Schmidt" and Nicole Kidman for her role as suicidal writer Virginia Woolf in "The Hours."

"I don't know whether to be happy or ashamed because I thought we made a comedy," Nicholson said. The tragicomic "About Schmidt" features him as an aging man searching for meaning at the end of his life.

Kidman, who disguised her face with prosthetics for the role, said she was just glad "The Hours" was made into a film. "It was a tricky movie in terms of the subject matter," she said.

"Chicago" co-stars Renee Zellweger and Richard Gere won for best musical-comedy acting, and Meryl Streep and Chris Cooper received supporting performer honors for the loopy screenwriting comedy "Adaptation."

Martin Scorsese received the best director for the Civil War era immigrant saga "Gangs of New York," a film he had wanted to make for decades that, once completed, was delayed for more than a year by Miramax Films.

Zellweger, who played a star-struck prisoner in "Chicago" trying to beat a murder charge, thanked co-star Catherine Zeta-Jones, whom she beat in the category. "You're a goddess and I'm so glad the world now knows what you can do," Zellweger told her while onstage.

'I don't win anything'

"I'm literally totally shocked. I don't win anything," said Gere, who played a slick lawyer in the musical. "And I didn't even want to do this movie. That's what I know."

Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor took best screenplay for "About Schmidt."

Irish rockers U2 won the best movie song award for "The Hands That Built America" from "Gangs of New York" and composer Elliot Goldenthal received the best original score award for "Frida."

The ceremony, hosted by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, is considered by some to be a barometer for the upcoming Academy Award nominations in February. Many of the nominated films have been unavailable in most parts of the country as studios waited to do wide-releases closer to the awards ceremony and next month's Oscar nominations.

"The Shield" won for best TV drama, upsetting such major shows as "The Sopranos" and "The West Wing," and its star, Michael Chiklis, was named best actor in a drama series. His Golden Globe follows his surprise Emmy victory last year for playing a rogue cop on the violent, profanity-laced series on the little-watched FX cable channel.

HBO's acerbic sitcom "Curb Your Enthusiasm" won best TV comedy series.

The dramatic TV actress award went to Edie Falco for her performance as the unhappy wife of gangster Tony Soprano in HBO's "The Soprano." Gasping that she was suffering from laryngitis, she accepted her award by flapping her hands and whispering, "I can't talk."

Jennifer Aniston won best TV comedy actress for NBC's "Friends," while Tony Shalhoub received the TV comedy actor's trophy for the USA detective show "Monk."

Gene Hackman accepted the Cecil B. DeMille Award, which honors the star of "The Conversation" and "Crimson Tide" for his career spanning more than 80 films. His roles in "The French Connection" and "Unforgive" won him both Golden Globes and Academy Awards and he received an additional Golden Globe honor last year for the comedy "The Royal Tenenbaums."

Golden Globe honors are chosen by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association's roughly 90 members, who cover Hollywood for overseas publications.

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