Emmy Thoughts

Here are a few random musings of mine from watching tonight's Emmy broadcast:

The Family Guy episode which brought us the original version of that opening song (about the "freakin' FCC") was probably the best episode of that show ever. This re-tread of it tonight was not all that great. Except maybe for The Sopranos joke, but then who couldn't see that punch line coming from a thousand miles away? (And that close-up of T.R. Knight right after the mention of Isaiah Washington? Painfully awkward. Like an episode of The Office, without the funny.)

Ryan Seacrest was a pretty lame host. Fortunately, the show producers seemed to realize this, and hardly had him on camera at all. I think Ellen DeGeneres got as much screen time as he did. (And she was awesome, naturally.)

Putting the ceremony in the round was the dumbest idea in the history of award shows. Clearly this decision was made by people who don't understand how to actually stage performances in the round. Of course, there were many great digs on this ill-informed choice (perhaps the best from James Spader, who remarked about having been to thousands of concerts and never having had worse seats), and there are sure to be more in critical coverage after the fact. In short, they'll never do this again.

I don't know what force in the fashion world handed down the decree that "floppy, unevenly mashed-down breasts in dresses slit almost to the navel" is the it look, but that person is wrong, wrong, wrong. It was really unflattering on every woman who wore it, which sadly seemed to be all but about three women in all of Hollywood.

I'm really pleased the vote for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama went against expectations and that Terry O'Quinn won. Though I like Michael Emerson's performance on Lost even more, both are consistently excellent on the show. And Terry O'Quinn's acceptance speech was both funny and classy.

As Stephen Colbert playfully foreshadowed on his most recent show (Thursday night), he again lost the award to a famous pop idol in a one-time only performance of songs he's sung countless times before. Tony Bennett will no doubt replace Barry Manilow as a new object of (loving) scorn to the Colbert Nation.

And speaking of scorn, so many television critics heap undeserved scorn on Boston Legal. And I'm sure it's going to double with James Spader's win tonight.

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert's presentation was quite funny. It ran longer than it should have, but was still good. Though not as funny as their decision to give the award to Steve Carell in winner Ricky Gervais' absence.

Lewis Black's monologue was awesome. But like any TV network is going to act upon anything he said, no matter how much applause it received. Not even FOX, the network that actually aired the rant, I'm sure.

30 Rock in a bit of a surprise upset win for Best Comedy Series... kinda reminds me a bit of when Arrested Development won in its first year. Except I watched Arrested Development. (Sorry, Tina Fey... I think you're great, but I tried your show for a month when it first came on, and I thought it was strangely unfunny, coming from you.)