The star wattage that usually heralds the arrival of awards season just got a lot dimmer.

Unable to reach an agreement with striking writers to preserve a Golden Globes ceremony threatened by an actors’ guild boycott, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association yesterday called off the show, agreeing instead to a one-hour news conference announcing the awards winners on NBC.

While certainly a victory for the writers, who claimed their highest-profile casualty yet in their two-month skirmish with big studio bosses, it’s a major setback for NBC. The network averaged 20 million viewers for last year’s Globes, seen as the opening of awards season and, with its open bar, a lot more fun than its more sober cousin, the Academy Awards.

The bigger question now is what will happen to the Oscars, scheduled for Feb. 24 on ABC and annually one of the biggest draws on television. Last year’s ceremony drew 40.2 million total viewers, ranking behind only the Super Bowl in 2007.

The Writers Guild of America has already denied an Academy request to air some past footage of movies, whose rights belong to the guild, a move many took as a signal that the WGA plans to take a hard line in negotiations for the show.

Guild member Jon Stewart is supposed to host, but he has not commented on whether he’ll fulfill the obligation. The WGA has indicated it will not provide a waiver to script the program, and like the Globes, the Oscars would be crippled by the threat of a Screen Actors Guild boycott.

SAG has been a strong supporter of the writers, in part because it has its own upcoming contract negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, and a favorable WGA deal would help secure a more favorable SAG deal.

While actors certainly revel in the pageantry of the awards ceremonies, few will want to cross the picket line, and the Academy Awards will not go forward without those big-name actors in attendance.

Still, the WGA is also at risk of squandering the favorable public opinion it has built over the last nine weeks. Viewers were tolerant of the strike in November, when episodes of their favorite shows were still on the air and the only thing in reruns were the late-night shows.

Now, with audience favorites like the Globes and Oscars in danger and shows like “Grey’s Anatomy” segueing into reruns, public opinion could shift away from the writers.

That seems a risk the union is willing to take as it begins engaging in negotiations with individual production houses.

Producers are accusing WGA leadership of entering such talks capriciously, striking side deals with Tom Cruise’s United Artists and David Letterman’s Worldwide Pants but ignoring overtures from Globes producer Dick Clark Productions and Comedy Central.

The Globes will still be handed out Sunday, albeit in a very different format.
NBC reportedly will not pay the usual $5 million fee to televise the event.

Instead, it plans to air a one-hour press conference announcing the winners, preceded by a Golden Globes retrospective show and a “Dateline NBC” special with footage of interviews with nominees.

NBC may also air a one-hour special following the press conference about various Hollywood parties planned around the event, but it’s unclear if those parties will still go on in wake of the cancellation.

"We are all very disappointed that our traditional awards ceremony will not take place this year and that millions of viewers worldwide will be deprived of seeing many of their favorite stars celebrating 2007's outstanding achievements in motion pictures and television," HFPA president Jorge Camara said in a statement released yesterday.