Golden Globe nominations make for history-making day for female directors

It’s a Golden Globes first, but hopefully, not a Golden Globes last.

For the first time in the award show’s history, three female directors earned nominations for best director on Wednesday, bringing calls for increased recognition for the work of women in Hollywood to an important moment.

Nominees Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland”), Emerald Fennell (“Promising Young Woman”) and Regina King (“One Night in Miami”) bring the total number of woman nominated in the category in the Globes’ 78-year history to eight.

The other best director nominees this year were David Fincher (“Mank”) and Aaron Sorkin (“The Trial of the Chicago 7”).

Zhao, King and Fennell join a short but prestigious list of fellow female nominees in the category. Barbara Streisand, Jane Campion, Sofia Coppola, Ava DuVernay and Kathryn Bigelow have also been nominated in the category, with Streisand being the sole winner among them.

Streisand won the best director Golden Globe in 1983 for “Yentl.”

In hailing King’s accomplishment for her directorial feature film debut on Wednesday, Amazon Studios also pointed out that she is now the second Black woman nominated in the category.

Zhao, meanwhile, is the first woman of Asian descent to be nominated in the category.

The Golden Globes will air Sunday, February 28, 2021 on NBC, with hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler.