I live blog the 2010 Emmys, featuring Jimmy Fallon, a lot of Glee and a Modern Family swarm.
Join me here for the next three hours for this Emmy live blog. Share your thoughts in the comments and Twitter, and we’ll see how all this goes…
1 | The opening number and monologue (5:00)
I’m glad I ended up warming to Glee, because it looks like we’re gonna get a lot of it tonight.
Although I kinda feel bad for the second-tier Glee cast. Like Quinn and Santana and Puck and the spacey girl and the breakdancing Asian guy. It was enough that Rachel and Finn got to do 90 percent of the duets during the season, at least let the other ones get a little bit of affection.
Oh, first Conan joke. And there was a Will Arnett sighting with Amy Poehler. (How did he never get an Emmy.)
Are we getting dangerously close to Betty White oversaturation?
Wait, they still nominate Jon Cryer for Emmys? Wow.
I’m good with Eric Stonestreet winning. I watched about half the season of Modern Family and even though the character was made to be borderline cookie cutter, he elevates it. And also buys into it totally. Also, he has a believable relationship with a ginger, and that’s acting.
And his mom looks EXACTLY like him. No maternity test needed there.
2 | Writing, supporting actress and more (5:20)
This is already easier than those World Cup live blogs I did earlier this summer. Ya know, since there are commercials. I drank like eight Diet Cokes at lunch and I can actually take bathroom breaks.
Well this new season of The Apprentice looks completely skip-able.
Jim Parsons remains among my favorite actors on TV. Even though watching him in interviews he seems to be at least 75 percent actually Sheldon. (With the affectations, minus the theoretical physics knowledge.)
Modern Family is now two for two. And now the world will finally know that the Christopher Lloyd who created it ISN’T Doc Brown.
And so far the Twitter-submitted presenter intros are 0 for one.
Stephen Colbert’s shtick was OK but I think I’ve come to expect more from him. He and Stewart have rocked the shit out of the Emmys before.
Was Kristen Wiig wearing a Dracula robe?
I’m on board with Jane Lynch winning too. Sue Sylvester, much like Cam on Modern Family, is a character who’s been elevated by the actor. I think this might be the first time I’ve ever watched the Emmys and agreed with both winners. Then again, with no win for Jeremy Piven or Tony Shaloub, it’s not that bad.
3 | Jim Parsons, Modern Family, more (5:36)
Ryan Murphy thanking his partner marks the second gay thanks already of the awards. I like it! The people who wouldn’t are still driving home from the Glenn Beck rally yesterday anyway.
They’re really frontloading these acting awards. We’re going to have a long dead miniseries stretch.
Jim Parsons with the most deserved win since Arrested won for best series.
Both John and Ren in the comments have addressed the stereotypical gay guys on Modern Family and I usually find myself in the middle on that. Basically, half the characters on the show feel very 2-D and half feel original. I’ve always leaned on the side that the gay guys, while originally cut from two very, very, very basic gay stereotypes, both tend to transcend that. All the white kids on the show, however, do not.
I’ve never watched a minute of Nurse Jackie and, after Lea Michele murders Edie Falco in 15 minutes, I may never get to.
4 | Reality, supporting drama actor, more (5:50)
This reality TV montage is making me realize I barely watch reality TV anymore. I think this year I only watched a big of Biggest Loser and Top Chef, in both cases because my girlfriend made me. Oh, and Jersey Shore. But that’s barely reality at this point, right?
I wish L.A. had better food delivery options. Something about this show is making me hungry. (Much like these pretzels are making me thirsty.)
You know, for someone who has his own late night talk show, Jimmy Fallon seems desperately reliant on hiding behind a prop.
I think I need to start watching Breaking Bad.
Ah the SVU crew. I am scared that I’m falling back into the SVU reruns trap. Lately as I’ve been working I’ve been turning on the reruns. It’s been long enough since I watched them that they’re all new to me again. It’s such a dangerous trap. Soon you start thinking you’re seeing crimes happening everywhere.
Weird Aaron Paul story: I actually interviewed him about 10 years ago when I was in college and he was in some random teen movie. (I’ll look it up after I post this.) He was manic and kinda over-the-top. I had no idea he’d go on to this. Much like I had no idea when I was watching National Lampoon’s Senior Trip that 15 years later Jeremy Renner would go on to become a giant star.
Edit: The movie with Aaron Paul was called Whatever It Takes.
5 | Drama awards and more (6:10)
Twitter now 0 for 2. That feature ain’t coming back next year.
Well I think it’s safe to say I’ve never heard of the woman who just won from The Good Wife. And her speech sounds fairly rehearsed, which is bold. After she was speaking they showed an Indian guy — was he her husband, or is it one of those things like after Denzel Washington wins an award they pan to Halle Berry or Ludacris?
If there’s one show where people say to me “You should watch that,” it’s Friday Night Lights by a landslide.
Seeing Bryan Cranston win awards always makes me wonder… how’s Dewey doing?
Holy shit, Ann-Margret gets the Helen Mirren GILF Award. She’s 69 and IS she!
Oh Jimmy Fallon. There is comedy outside of the realm of song. Even Operaman knows that.
Apparently this is what happened to Dewey. I now feel older than normal.
6 | Dramatic actress (6:30)
Twitter intros 0 for 3.
It’s so weird to me how Mariska got nominated for best dramatic actress one time and has now been grandfathered in every year. Like, of all the procedurals in the world, they picked one actor from one show and decided to use her as the token nominee. Why couldn’t it have been Ice-T? David Caruso? Or any of the random models who they hired to play ADAs on Law & Order once they gave up on any semblance of believability a few years ago?
Kyra Sedgwick just quoted Kevin Bacon. Literally, attributed a quote to him. Come on.
Pretty big night for Joel McHale. He was in the intro, the comedy montage, he’s presenting. He’s really getting elevated. Somewhere Hal Sparks is fuming.
I do not and will not ever like Bill Maher. I hated Religulous and I don’t laugh at anything he says. So he’s probably going to win.
The Tony awards are 1/4th away from an EGOT.
Ricky Gervais. Not sick of him yet somehow. His timing on the Mel Gibson joke (in terms of how he timed the punchline, not making a Mel Gibson joke on August 28th) was what made him a rich man.
7 | Variety (6:51)
Here we go, the Conan award…
Conan lost. Most anticipated Emmy speech ever averted. Seriously. The crowd could not be more tepid. Not only did Conan’s show lose but Jon Stewart wasn’t even there to accept with his team. The air just got sucked out of the room. Jimmy Fallon had better bust out another song parody.
Ren in the comments just pointed out someone tried to hand Matthew Perry a beer when Ricky Gervais had them give them to the crowd. I missed that. Hilarious though. I wonder if Aaron Sorkin’s in the crowd in case someone tries to top Ricky Gervais and have them hand coke out to the crowd.
8 | Miniseries time (7:04)
Clooney handled that humanitarian award pretty well. Better than his Oscar acceptance speech a few years back when he said that Hollywood was the driving force behind the Civil Rights Movement.
And now we enter miniseries time. With only 56 minutes left in this show, they’re really gonna have to plow through these. (I didn’t watch any of them, by the way. Did anyone? Has anyone ever?)
Weird as this sounds, I kinda wish there was more of Glee in this show. Or even 30 seconds with Tracy Morgan.
Death montage! Let’s see what happens here…
Very modest applause for most of the people. Or maybe Jewel’s warbling is drowning them out?
Near silence for Corey Haim. Gary Coleman gets a louder reception. Andrew Koenig gets nothing. He had a sad downward spiral. Growing Pains was a good show. The captain from the Deadliest Catch made it? Wow.
Rue McClanahan or Dennis Hopper might have been the loudest. Very underwhelming In Memoriam this year.
By my calculations, these awards are going to run long. And they sure have hit a wall. Somebody do something!
9 | More miniseries and hopefully something else too (7:23)
Redacted.
I think if I’m doing the Emmy schedule, I go comedy, miniseries, reality, drama, variety, then the big awards. When everyone’s already two-and-a-half hours deep in this, the miniseries have too narrow of an audience to keep the momentum going.
Claire Danes has definitely aged well, like some kind of fine angsty cheddar.
It’s kind of sad to think about how many people tuned in to see the True Blood stars do that.
Come on, Al Pacino. Say something crazy! I feel like Bart with his fingers crossed saying “crazy scheme crazy scheme crazy scheme!”
Nope. He’s going with slow-talking old man instead of raving lunatic. Damn.
Well, at least the miniseries awards featured two people standing up in the crowd — one of whom was actually Dr. Jack. With how these awards are dragging, I think we might be able to use his handiwork on the broadcast soon.
10 | Four to go? (7:44)
From what Wikipedia is telling me, all that’s left is the four “Best” awards – comedy, drama, miniseries, TV movie.
There were only two miniseries nominated for the award? What the hell? Does that mean if I’d filmed a miniseries and talked PBS into running it (possibly by promising to donate more than enough to earn the free coffee mug) that I could’ve been nominated just to flesh out the category? I think I just found myself a fall project.
Was that a nipple? (I’m going to go back through and check for sure next time I have a break.)
11 | Best comedy, best drama (7:50)
Jimmy Fallon makes a last ditch effort and Tom Selleck shuts him down quickly. Sigh.
Wait, are they giving the Best Drama award before the Best Comedy award? Has that ever happened before?
I love that the Mad Men guy just started continuing his speech from when he got cut off during his writing award. That’s a pretty badass move.
Is there any group of people that wouldn’t be upstaged by Christina Hendricks’s breasts?
Might as well throw in a quick token It’s Always Sunny should’ve been nominated.
Wow, Modern Family really beat Glee a lot. I think that’s got to be considered an upset, right?
—
So all in all, I don’t think there was anything particularly stunning about this year’s awards. No iconic moment. Entertaining enough, though, right? And some deserving winners.
I want to thank everyone for joining in on the live blog. I don’t have full stats yet but at least 50,000 people dropped by (or five people just refreshed the blog 10,000 times each) and that’s pretty amazing.
See you at the VMAs?
