As the awards season gets into full swing, Steve Pratt sifts through the potential winners and losers – and concludes that Colin Firth will be crowned king of the movies.

COLIN FIRTH is a star – that’s official.

Being awarded the Walk of Fame’s 2,429th star on Hollywood Boulevard is going to be the first of many honours the British actor will collect in the coming weeks.

Every which way you look, there’s an awards ceremony for something or other. Film, television, music. No one is left out, making you wonder if there are enough prizes to go round. And there are only so many mumbling, stumbling, incoherent acceptance speeches anyone can bear to hear.

The participants, especially the losers, will tell you it’s not the winning, but the taking part. “It’s an honour just to be nominated, I’d like to thank my agent, my director, my hairpiece and my goldfish for making me a better person” – you’ve heard it all before, usually accompanied by air-punching or sobs.

The point of awards is not to pat on the back those who deserve it, but to boost the income of those involved. For the rest of us, it’s not the winning, but the cock-ups, arguments and inappropriate gowns that make it entertaining.

Take Firth’s acceptance of his Walk of Fame star. The reports weren’t about his powerful acting in The King’s Speech, but the fact that he shed a tear during the presentation while saying nice things about his wife.

He doesn’t need to go for the sympathy vote.

His brilliant portrayal of stammering King George VI will win him the Golden Globe best actor at tomorrow’s ceremony. That will be followed by Oscar, Bafta and a few other nominations.

Many will be converted to wins.

He won the Bafta as a gay English professor at a US college in A Single Man last year, but lost to Jeff Bridges at the Academy Awards.

Ironically, Bridges is likely to be his main opposition again, for his True Grit performance as one-eyed sheriff Rooster Cogburn, the role that earned John Wayne his only Oscar in the original version.

But this is the British actor’s year to go Firth and multiply his awards.

He’s the front-runner for a Golden Globe award on Sunday, where The King’s Speech leads the nominations with seven nods, including best drama and acting honours for Helena Bonham Carter and Geoffrey Rush, as well as Firth.

Other best drama nominees are ballet psychodrama Black Swan, The Fighter, sci-fi blockbuster Inception and Facebook chronicle The Social Network.

Not a bad list, all worthy of being included.

Some other nominees are a different matter.

How the badly-reviewed Angelina Jolie/Johnny Depp thriller The Tourist and Cher’s so-badit’s- good musical Burlesque earned inclusion among the best comedy/musical category is anyone’s guess.

While Christopher Nolan’s Inception has nominations for director, screenplay and musical score, its cast don’t get a look in. Nothing either for the Coen brothers’ western, True Grit. That will be remedied when the Oscar nominations are revealed as the Coens have previously taken best picture with No Country For Old Men.

That’s part of the fun of the awards season – seeing how people react when obviously worthy contenders are snubbed. Then there are the ceremonies themselves, seemingly unaffected by the recession-caused cutbacks or warnings against binge drinking.

AN added danger at the Golden Globes is employing British funny man Ricky Gervais to host the show.

Last year, he took the mickey out of some of the big names, and those present will be on the edge of their seats hoping he doesn’t pick on them this time.

The Oscars ceremony, too, promises something different by choosing young Hollywood stars James Franco and Anne Hathaway to host the night rather than comedians such as Steve Martin or Billy Crystal, who’ve done it in the past.

Not only do we have to watch the awards shows, but the preamble too. Even the British Comedy Awards gets its own nominations show on C4 tonight.

The presenter can make or break an awards show. Who can forget – no matter how much they try – the shambles of Sam Fox and Mick Fleetwood hosting the Brit Awards?

This year’s Brits nominees, announced this week, see rapper Tinie Tempah lead the field with four nominations and veterans Take That hoping for success in both the album and group categories.

While no one was arguing about the performers, there were mutterings, and not in a nice way, about Gavin And Stacey star James Corden hosting the show at London’s 02 Arena on February 15. He presented the awards in 2009 with fellow Gavin and Stacey star Mathew Horne and Kylie.

Corden was quoted as saying he was disappointed and a “bit shocked” by the negative public reaction to the announcement.

No one has objected to Dermot O’Leary hosting the National Television Awards at the O2 on January 26, presumably because he does such a good job on The X Factor.

These are different to the other awards in that the public votes for the winners. But is it really possible to chose between Doctor Who and Sherlock Holmes?

Both Matt Smith, who faced a tough time taking over as the Time Lord from popular David Tennant in the BBC1 series, and Benedict Cumberbatch, the Baker Street sleuth in the same channel’s updating of the Conan Doyle classic, hope to win the best actor performance prize.

But it’s a strong line-up with Philip Glenister’s old-style copper Gene Hunt from Ashes To Ashes and five times winner of the award David Jason in contention, too.

Geordie duo Ant and Dec aim for a recordbreaking tenth consecutive win in the best entertainment presenter category. With The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent both up for the top talent show title, Simon Cowell is in competition with himself.

The public can vote online until noon on January 26 at nationaltelevisionawards.com Meanwhile, Colin Firth can put on his tuxedo and wait to be crowned. He’s already been royally honoured when Helen Mirren, an Oscar-winner for playing the present monarch in The Queen, presented him with a best actor gong at the Palm Springs International Film Festival, the first big film awards of the season.

The headline said it all: King Gets Crowned By Queen. Firth can expect a lot more of those in coming weeks.