Poor NBC. Last week, with the writing on the wall (or, more accurately, the Writers Guild still on strike), the network was forced to forgo plans for its broadcast of the Golden Globe Awards. Exit red-carpet entrances and 7-second-delayed stars too tanked to thank straight. In their place? A live press conference announcing the winners, with the night handled by the network’s news division.

Makes perfect sense. Covering an awards show is just like reporting on presidential campaigns: “Cate Blanchett listens to Bob Dylan, finds her own voice!”

I tuned into the pre-show (pre-conference?) Dateline while at the gym to see how this was all going to go down. And go down it did. In less than five minutes after the opening credits, Hoda Kotb was interviewing Kyra Sedgwick, and I almost tripped on the elliptical trying to switch over to 60 Minutes. (I’m proud I didn’t reach for the remote as soon as I saw that Tiki Barber was going to be part of this B-team broadcast. That’s the patience of a saint right there, I tell ya.)

Maybe once the the 2008 Press Conference hangovers have worn off, the Golden Globes will finally have been revealed for the very fake awards show it is. The Hollywood Foreign Press? Come on. (Ok, maybe the Globes aren’t as fake as the World Music Awards.) But stripped of the glitz and glamour, perhaps this year’s model was just too real to deal with—too ordinary, too whatever, too who-cares?

Still, there was joy in Mad-ville tonight. And props to Tina Fey of 30 Rock. (That we didn’t get to hear a live acceptance speech from the woman who birthed Liz Lemon? Blurg.)