At the 2022 Emmys, a great night for first-time winners—and Ted Lasso
Count Jennifer Coolidge, Sheryl Lee Ralph, and Hwang Dong-hyuk among the stars who had themselves a big evening at the Emmys
Aux News the 2022 Emmys
The 2022 Emmys started off on a good foot with Michael Keaton’s win for Lead Actor In A Limited Series for Dopesick and first-timer Murray Bartlett winning the Supporting Actor equivalent for White Lotus. It was actually a hell of a good night for first-timers in general, with Bartlett’s White Lotus co-star Jennifer Coolidge also winning her first Emmy (though the thrill of her win was undercut by some needlessly aggressive play-off music) along with The Dropout’s Amanda Seyfried.
In addition, there were several history-making first-timers: Sheryl Lee Ralph’s win for Abbott Elementary made her the first Black woman to win that category in 35 years (and her hugely joyous and triumphant speech was one of the early highlights). Another big first-time winner was Squid Game’s Hwang Dong-hyuk, who is also the first person from South Korea to win that category. Same with Squid Game’s Lee Jung-Jae, who is the first actor of Asian descent and the first person from South Korea to win Best Actor In A Drama.
There were also some non-first-time winners, like Saturday Night Live, Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, and Jason Sudeikis for Ted Lasso. We’ve all seen them win 100 times each, but sometimes traditions are comforting. Speaking of things getting a lot of wins: HBO and HBO Max completely destroyed the competition, with HBO Max in particular edging out its premium cable sibling thanks to Hacks and White Lotus winning a bunch of awards.
Ted Lasso remains unbeatable, though, and it single-handedly kept Apple TV+ in close contention against HBO (which, again, fell short of HBO Max, the streaming service being killed off by its brilliant corporate overlords). Actually, it’s only unbeatable when compared to every show that isn’t The White Lotus, which won five Emmys to Ted Lasso’s four. Third place in that ranking went to Succession, which didn’t have an especially blockbuster night until its win for Best Drama Series (no offense to Emmy-winning writer Jesse Armstrong and Emmy-winning Supporting Actor Matthew Macfadyen). The only other shows to win multiple awards were Abbott Elementary and Squid Game.
Elsewhere during the show, host Kenan Thompson and a crew of backup dancers opened the event with musical numbers set to modern TV show themes like the one from Friends and the one from Game Of Thrones (in their defense, House Of The Dragon is just using the exact same theme, so that’s a little timely). It was inoffensive and brief, which is pretty much the best thing you can ask for in an awards show these days. There was also a very short appearance from Kenan’s old Nickelodeon partner Kel Mitchell, even though it was a little strange how short it was. Other than that, and all winners aside, one thing everyone can agree on is that the play-off music was way too aggressive. The show only ran a few minutes over, they could’ve let some of the winners talk longer!
You can see the full list of winners from tonight’s Emmys at this link.
15 Comments
The OG MILF finally gets recognised. Hell, she needs an AVN achievement award for launching an entire category of porn.
Weird dig at Ted Lasso, whose only crime was… having kind of a sophomore slump? Like, it’s not even a bad show, and it’s not even like it beat out some monumentally better show. SNL and Last Week Tonight winning yet again are far more egregious—especially the former over the brilliant and hilarious A Black Lady Sketch Show.
it’s not very good season of tv, though. I’ll give Lasso all the credit for it’s first season but s2 is just kind of a formless, shapeless, snooze.
Whether or not it’s a snooze, agree to disagree. But season two clearly has ideas and goals—Ted reckoning with therapy, Sam’s activism and relationship with Rebecca, Nate’s descent into being an asshole, the ups and downs of Roy and Keeley’s relationship, etc. All of that is there. Whether you agree that it’s successful in achieving everything it’s going for is something else–and I would agree that a lot of what it’s tackling is uneven, but far from formless or shapeless.
Like, it’s not even a bad showAgreed! It’s a perfectly nice and fine show. But outstanding comedy? Like, the best? I’d probably rank it last amongst the other nominees.
EDIT: Nevermind. You thought Hacks and Only Murders in the Building were better… you’re either being deliberately provocative or have taste so wild it’s not even worth it.
I haven’t finished S2 of Hacks, but yes, I’d say I enjoyed it slightly more? Just a wild provocateur! Squeeeeee!
I mean… I did offer a second option. And it sounds like that’s the one that applies.
ABLSS season 1 was excellent, but the following seasons haven’t lived up to the magic for me. It’s not terrible, but the hit to miss ratio in season 1 was so high and the sketches were better conceived. Then again it’s been a while since I’ve watched a full episode of SNL, let alone the whole season, so I can’t compare the two.
#justicef4BetterCallSaul
The reason they split season six the way they did is so the second half would be eligible for the 2023 Emmys. Rhea Seehorn will get her due then.
I get that this was the plan, but I worry that it’s too cute by half. People didn’t vote for it this year because they know they’ll have another chance next time, but by then the show won’t have aired for more than a year, and voters may have forgotten about it.Carol Burnett might have a good shot of winning Best Guest Actress in a Drama, but if the show ends up going 0 for 50-something, it will be a disappointing but not surprising end for what may be the last great series of TV’s Second Golden Age.
Oh wait, I just remembered that Burnett won’t be eligible for Best Guest Actress, since she appeared in more than 50 percent of the last half-season’s episodes. So she’d have to submit for Best Supporting Actress, where she’d a) face more competition and b) possibly split the vote for Rhea Seehorn, or push Seehorn into the tougher Best Actress category.So, yeah, I’m even more resigned to the series getting permanently shut out of Emmy recognition.
I saw The White Lotus. It wasn’t very good*. Can A/V Club do an expose’ on what kind of PR pushes different shows/networks did? I understand Abbott Elementary’s was notable. I also believe The White Lotus’s was monumental.*Jennifer Coolidge and Mike White are treasures
Why are you carping about the play-off music? As you said, the show ran long.