Raise a glass, folks…
As I mentioned last night, I was working a metro shift Sunday night. Got out at a reasonable time, but then I had homework, so I let the Emmys wait until this morning — and have no thoughts about the show as a show. But my reactions to the winners in some of the major categories are after the jump.
Very nice to see "Mad Men" win best drama. Out of all the shows out there, I would have preferred that the win went to "The Wire," which ended a marvelous run with a powerful season. But since the Emmys didn't even nominate "The Wire," "Mad Men" was the best of the lot that was nominated — and, as regular readers here know, a show that I admired very, very much.
Would have liked to see Jon Hamm get the Emmy for best actor in a drama, though. Not that I dislike Bryan Cranston, and I would have taken Cranston over the perennial James Spader any day. But where Cranston's performance was showy, Hamm's was subtler, and all the more fascinating for what it revealed about Don Draper and what it kept buttoned up.
Now, this may seem as if I am contradicting what I just say about best actor in a drama, but in best actress I would have gone for Holly Hunter over Glenn Close. Part of that is my preferring "Saving Grace" to "Damages." But more is that, while Close was fine, Hunter's performance is not merely flashy but a force of nature — unfettered, unlimited, and with all sorts of fascinating twists and turns over the course of a season. Of course, Emmy voters don't have to watch an entire season of a show — which may have worked against Hunter, and undoubtedly hurt Hamm vs. Cranston. (Again, I should say that I like Cranston, and his work generally, but "Breaking Bad" still gave him single-episode opportunities that were grander than Hamm's more nuanced efforts.)
On the comedy side, no argument over Alec Baldwin. Brilliant, deserved the Emmy, would have been a crime if anyone else had won. Tina Fey, fine in every area that she won. Even as an actress, she had some great moments this year. And when you're trying to choose between "30 Rock" and "The Office" for best comedy, you're a winner either way. "The Office" had moments of brilliance this year, especially with the dinner-party episode, but "30 Rock" threw off sparks, too — the season finale, "Midnight Train to Georgia" … Oh, I could go off into a long rhapsodic monologue but it's too early for that.
There were other winners, of course, including Jeremy Piven, Jean Smart and "The Amazing Race." Happy that "Race" won, just because I like the show, but it's also a predictable pick — six years in a row. "John Adams," best miniseries? I couldn't get through it. Happy about the "Matt Damon" song winning — which it did during the previous Creative Arts Emmys — if only because it continues a tradition of Emmy winners whose titles can't be said uncensored on the Emmy show. As we speak, someone is writing a song full of bleepable material just in the hope that it will win an Emmy next year.
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The show as a show was a complete train wreck. The reality hosts blathered on (literally) about nothing for 10 minutes, which they tried to get back by limiting acceptance speeches to 20 sec. and cutting all bits. It was like the SPJ Awards dinner with better dresses. It seemed like most of the winners were actors people knew from other work (probably because of the truncated season). Jean Smart? I like Samantha Who?, but I doubt that's why she won. Mad Men was unaffected by (maybe even helped by) the strike and 30 Rock was really the only interesting comedy last year (The Office is really just too cringey for me – I watch, I turn away, I turn back, I turn away again). The entire contest was just way too predictable.
It was a mixed bag this year. I have no great gripes with any of the winners (other than Carrie Fisher not winning and Tim Conway not being able to be there–particularly with Harvey Korman's passing, I just really felt his absence). I loved the Ricky Gervais/Steve Carell bit, and it was good to see Tom Smothers get his due. But the opening dragged forever, and the Laugh-In reunion just seemed rather sad. But a very strong finish with 30 Rock winning again–having Mary Tyler Moore and Betty White present to Tina Fey seemed like a very nice "passing of the torch," and obviously this was not lost on Tina, either, if you saw her bow down to the two of them on her way up to the podium.