In the latest episode of Hollywood eating its own tail, actor Blaine Everhart has snagged the prestigious Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Drama for his role in 'The Pretender's Pretender,' where he plays an actor pretending to act in a movie about acting. Critics are calling it the most meta performance since that one time a mirror looked at itself.

Everhart's character, loosely based on a real-life method actor who once spent six months living as a squirrel to prepare for a nut allergy PSA, spends the entire film auditioning for a role by faking bad acting. 'It was challenging,' Everhart admitted in his acceptance speech, 'because I had to act like I was acting badly while actually acting good at acting bad.' The audience nodded knowingly, pretending to understand.

Film buffs are divided: some hail it as a groundbreaking commentary on the industry's navel-gazing, while others suspect it's just an elaborate inside joke that accidentally won an award. 'If this keeps up,' quipped one anonymous studio exec, 'next year we'll have an award for the best actor playing an actor who wins an award for playing an actor.'

Everhart prepared for the role by shadowing washed-up soap opera stars and attending improv classes where he intentionally bombed every scene. 'I immersed myself in the art of mediocrity,' he said, 'which, let's face it, is 90% of Hollywood anyway.' His co-stars reportedly had to stifle laughter during takes, or was that part of the act?

The film's director, known for mind-bending plots like 'Inception but with more therapy sessions,' defended the project's depth. 'It's not just acting; it's meta-acting. We're questioning the very essence of performance.' When asked if that essence includes overpaid celebrities congratulating each other, he changed the subject to craft services.

Awards season insiders predict this could spark a trend of increasingly recursive roles. Up next: a biopic about an actor who played an actor in a movie about an actor winning an award for playing an actor. 'It's turtles all the way down,' joked a film critic, who then admitted he was just pretending to get the reference.

Everhart, basking in his glory, announced his next project: starring in a sequel where his character pretends to win an award for pretending to act. 'Art imitates life imitating art,' he mused, as the crowd applauded what might have been sarcasm.