Rose Byrne won her first Golden Globe on Sunday night. She did it without her husband in the room.
The Australian actress took home Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy for her performance in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, a dark A24 comedy about a therapist buckling under the weight of her daughter’s chronic illness, an absent husband, and a life quietly unraveling around her. Critics have described the film as “Uncut Gems for moms.” Byrne had already won the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival for the role.
But at the Beverly Hilton on Sunday, the seat next to her was empty. Bobby Cannavale, her partner of 13 years, was somewhere in New Jersey. At a reptile convention.
Byrne broke the news herself during her acceptance speech, delivering it with the same comic timing that earned her the award in the first place.
“I want to thank my husband, Bobby Cannavale,” she told a room full of Hollywood’s elite. “He couldn’t be here because we’re getting a bearded dragon, and he went to a reptile expo in New Jersey.”
She paused.
“So, thank you, baby.”
The audience laughed.
lol at this moment from Rose Byrne’s Golden Globes speech
“I want to thank my husband, Bobby Cannavale, who couldn’t be here because we’re getting a bearded dragon and he went to a reptile expo in New Jersey, so thank you, baby” pic.twitter.com/KgVmf8SH9R
— Spencer Althouse (@SpencerAlthouse) January 12, 2026
The expo in question is Reptilecon, part of the larger Super Pet Expo held annually at the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center. It is, by all accounts, a significant event in the reptile enthusiast community.
Byrne had telegraphed the situation days earlier during an appearance on The Tonight Show. “He can’t come, which is such a bummer,” she told Jimmy Fallon on January 8, three days before the ceremony. “This expo is THE place to go.”
The bearded dragon, she explained, was for their two sons — Rocco, 9, and Rafael, 8. The boys wanted one. The expo fell on the same night as the Golden Globes. A choice had to be made.
“It would just be such a parent fail,” Byrne reasoned.
So Cannavale — a two-time Emmy winner known for Boardwalk Empire and the Ant-Man franchise — flew east while Byrne walked the red carpet with her brother instead.
The 46-year-old actress seemed genuinely stunned when her name was called. Her competition was stiff: Cynthia Erivo for Wicked: For Good, Emma Stone for Bugonia, Kate Hudson for Song Sung Blue, Amanda Seyfried for The Testament of Ann Lee, and Chase Infiniti for One Battle After Another.
Byrne used her time at the podium to emphasize just how unlikely her win was. The film, she said, was shot in 25 days on what she described as a budget of “like $8.50.”
“This is a tiny film,” she said. “So this is a huge thing to be up here.”
She thanked writer-director Mary Bronstein with visible emotion. “She wrote this unbelievable screenplay, and she wanted me to do it, and I can’t believe that you wanted me to do it. Baby, you’re just the best.”
She also shouted out her parents back in Sydney, who had purchased a Paramount+ subscription specifically to watch the broadcast. At one point, she accidentally referred to the ceremony as “the Golden Gloves.”
As of Sunday night, the bearded dragon remains unnamed.
