Jimmy Fallon doing the Golden Globes his way

Since he basically hosts a party every weeknight, Jimmy Fallon expects to feel at home at The Golden Globe Awards.

The current “Tonight Show” star succeeds others including Ricky Gervais and the team of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler as he presides over NBC’s telecast of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s 74th annual celebration of film and television tonight from Los Angeles’ Beverly Hilton Hotel. Movies and television programs of the past year will be honored, and Meryl Streep – a winner of eight Golden Globes – will receive the Cecil B. DeMille Award for career achievement, and Sylvester Stallone’s daughters Sophia, Sistine and Scarlet will help hand out the statues by sharing the title Miss Golden Globe.

Knowing the event’s typically loose feel, Fallon is planning to maintain it in his own way. Previously an Emmy Awards host, the “Saturday Night Live” alum says that “according to our network, this is the biggest award show that we have. I was like, ‘Let’s do it up. Let’s make it glitzy and glamorous.’ That’s what an award show should be; I love that type of stuff. After seeing Tina and Amy crush it, and Ricky crush it, I want to see what we can do that’s different but still keep it fun.”

Fallon indicates that will be “a lot of the stuff we do on the (‘Tonight’) show, and still keep that vibe. The surprises can be in who wins The Golden Globes, but we have that positivity that we’ve never lost from ‘The Tonight Show.’ I love pop culture and TV and movies. If there weren’t entertainers, I wouldn’t have a show … they’re all my guests. Basically, 90 percent of my guests will be in that (Golden Globes) audience, and it’s like, ‘Hey, we’re all here. This is so cool that we get to do this.’ It’s very showbizzy, and I like it.”

Though the Hollywood Foreign Press Association often takes its shots from The Golden Globes host during the show, the ever-friendly Fallon notes that “they’ve been super-great with me. They haven’t said ‘No’ to anything. There were a couple of changes I wanted to make, because I’ve been to The Golden Globes a couple of times as an audience member. It’s more the technical stuff; I’ve said, ‘What do you think about this or that?,’ and they’ve said, ‘Yeah, we can make that work.’”

On the movie front, “La La Land” leads the Golden Globe nominees with seven bids – and on the TV side, “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story” is in front with five nominations. The November announcement of Streep as the DeMille honoree gave Fallon an immediate dose of comfort about his role at the event: ‘I was like, ‘Oh, fantastic!’ Just to get Meryl Streep, that sets the bar. It’ll be a classy night, top-of-the-line. You can’t get much cooler than that.”

You also can’t write the show too far in advance, Fallon reasons, because of what other programs might do. “You come up with an idea for something, then somebody will host (an earlier award show) and they’ll take that idea. Then you get another idea, and ‘Saturday Night Live’ does a sketch with it. There are so many people doing variety now, I can’t plan that far ahead. It’s really tricky, but we have a general idea of what we want to do with the opening, and I don’t think anybody else will do that.”

Whatever the outcome, Fallon intends to enjoy himself as the Golden Globes unfold. “It’s definitely going to be a big night, and definitely fun,” he forecasts. “I know what it’s like to watch it, and the job’s not over for these entertainers (who appear at the ceremony), because this is being broadcast. It’s like, ‘Make it a good show for people at home.’ And it’s the best of film and TV, so it’s like two award shows in one.”