'Bawdy humor'

Gervais, who returned to the show as host after a three-year absence, sipped beer and took shots at everyone from Jennifer Lawrence to Matt Damon and at one of his favorite targets, the Golden Globes themselves.

"Listen, if you do win tonight, remember no one cares about that award as much as you do," he said.

Gervais riled up the audience with an opening monologue in which he called the A-list audience "disgusting, pill-popping, sexual deviant scum", setting the tone for the bawdy humor that filled the night.

There were a large number of bleeped-out words during the telecast of the show, from Jonah Hill swearing while pretending to be the bear from The Revenant, to Amy Schumer using an expletive while engaging in lighthearted banter with Lawrence.

Damon won best comedy actor for The Martian, about an astronaut stranded on Mars, and the film also won the best comedy/musical movie category.

Related:

'The Revenant' and 'The Martian' big Golden Globe winners