'Mildred Pierce' Emmy winner Kate Winslet hugs fellow winner Guy Pearce.
John Mccoy/ZUMA Press/Newscom
The Good: If you really have to ask what we’re going to kick off our “good” with when it comes to last night’s 63rd Annual EMMY Awards you clearly have yet to jump on the FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS bandwagon. So, before we continue we’re going to need you to immediately put a stop to whatever you’re doing and watch all five seasons of the now award-winning NBC/DirecTV drama so that you may properly appreciate the awesomeness of what we’re about to say. Living up to their “Clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose” mantra was the heart and soul of Texas, nominees Kyle Chandler and creator Jason Katims, both of whom walked away with much-deserved statues for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama and Outstanding Writing respectively. Continuing along the lines of deserving, albeit unexpected winners was Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama winner Margo Martindale for her fantastically received work on JUSTIFIED and the somewhat less surprising, albeit equally welcoming wins for MODERN FAMILY’s Outstanding Supporting Actor and Actress in a Comedy duo that was the husband and wife team of Julie Bowen (Claire Dunphy) and Ty Burrell (Phil Dunphy). That latter of whom gave what turned out to be one of the evening’s most moving acceptances speeches that saw him imaginging what his dearly departed Dad might have thought about him making a living by playing dress up and wearing makeup!
Also falling under the category of “good” was the hilarious beauty-pageant-esque manner that brought all six Outstanding Actress in a Comedy nominees on stage (Women of Comedy FTW!), the highly entertaining spoof featuring the newest arrivals to THE OFFICE (Including MAD MEN’s John Slattery, PARKS AND RECREATION’s Aziz Ansari and TWO AND A HALF MEN’s Ashton Kutcher) and if you’ll forgive us for dwelling on MODERN FAMILY again, co-creator Steve Levitan. Who not only took it upon himself to publicly embarrass his wife by revealing the inspiration for his Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Winning episode that saw his real-life kids walk in on him and his wife doing you know what, but for turning his Outstanding Comedy Series acceptance speech into a shout out to the show’s younger cast members who will probably never get the award recognition they so rightfully deserve. Said Levitan, “I especially want to point out all of the kids on the cast, MODERN FAMILY was this close to being animated. That’s how much we didn’t want to work with kids.”
The Bad: From Jane Lynch’s underwhelming opening number (Not-So-Fun-Fact: Leonard Nimoy was a last minute replacement for Alec Baldwin who dropped outdo due a censorship issue with Fox over a hacking scandal joke) to comedic bits that fell either fell flast (JERSEY Snoore!) or for some reason or other seemed to focus on the fact that she’s gay (Note to Hollywood: You’re here, you’re queer, we’re really okay with it!) Jane Lynch’s tour of [EMMY Hosting] duty did little but reconfirm what two seasons of GLEE has already illustrated, she is most effective in small doses.
On the hardware front, while it’s hard to argue with the likes of MAD MEN, THE AMAZING RACE and MODERN FAMILY walking away with golden-statues for their four, ninth and second consecutive wins respectively, it really would be nice if the Academy of Television Arts & Science spread the love around a wee bit (Paging PARKS AND RECREATION line one). But since that is pretty much out of our control, we’ll simply end this section of our EMMY rant by asking if MIKE & MOLLY’s Melissa McCarthy would have really won had she not made us fall out of our seat laughing for her role in this summer’s surprise smash that was Bridesmaids? Probably not.
The Ugly: As much as Hollywood loves a good comeback story, Charlie Sheen’s completely insincere image rehabilitation tour should in no way have been given center stage during last night’s celebration of television’s best and brightest. Suffice it to say, six months after the half-man-full-warlock almost cost hundreds of hard-working people both in front and behind the camera of TWO AND A HALF MEN their jobs and livelihood is far too brief a time to simply forgive and forget. And while we’re on the subject on things we wish we could forget, we believe comedianSarah Silverman said it best when she tweeted, “Whoever’s writing the voice over guy’s banter should not do that anymore.”
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