A few things to ponder about Sunday’s 65th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (CBS, 9 p.m. ET)…
Neil Patrick Harris is hosting for the first time in a few years, but he’s already demonstrated his hosting chops elsewhere, quite impressively, in other venues. He’s up for an Emmy this year for his work hosting the most recent Tony Awards, which he opened by singing and starring in one of the biggest opening production numbers ever staged on any awards show, period.
He should win – and if he does, it’ll make for a very enjoyable Emmy moment at Sunday’s live show.
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Not a single one of the actors or actresses on AMC’s Mad Men has ever walked away with an Emmy statuette – not ever, and not including last Sunday’s Creative Arts Emmy Awards. If that changes at Sunday’s Emmys, in either of the supporting or leading categories, it’ll be big news.
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Bryan Cranston has won for AMC’s Breaking Bad before – three times consecutively between 2008-2010. But the past two years, the Outstanding Actor in a Drama Series Emmy went, respectively, to Kyle Chandler of NBC’s Friday Night Lights and Damian Lewis of Showtime’s Homeland.
This, however, should be Cranston’s year. And if he wins, and if series creator Vince Gilligan does, with only one week left until their show’s finale, what a celebration it will be. Breaking Bad has yet to win as Outstanding Drama Series, and this could well be the year.
In Supporting Actor for a Drama Series, what a field: The nominees include both Aaron Paul (Jesse) and Jonathan Banks (Mike) from Breaking Bad, as well as Mandy Patinkin (Saul) from Homeland. Wow.
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Some of the categories are easier to call than others. For Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series, Claire Danes of Homeland should get it easily. But the winner for Outstanding Comedy Series? ABC’s Modern Family could well win it yet again – but boy, does FX’s Louie deserve some credit. Even the Emmy.
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For the Creative Arts Emmys, handed out last Sunday, one of the winners was Bob Newhart, winning in the Guest Actor in a comedy series for his role as former TV science-show icon Prof. Proton on CBS’s The Big Bang Theory. It was his first personal Emmy statuette win, despite having been nominated seven times, going back through more than a half-century of TV history.
Astoundingly, the talented comedian and TV icon had never won an Emmy for either The Bob Newhart Show nor Newhart. But his awards shelf wasn’t quite as empty as all the press reports made it sound.
Though he was nominated, but did not win, as one of the writers of 1961’s single-season The Bob Newhart Show, his NBC show did win an Emmy that year – as Outstanding Programming Achievement in the Field of Comedy. So even if the statue went to the executive producer, Newhart scored a big pyrrhic victory that year. Fifty-one years ago.
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Other winners already announced include Carrie Preston, for her Guest Actress work on CBS’s The Good Wife, and Melissa Leo, for her bold guest work on FX’s Louie. Good for both of them.
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Sunday’s Emmys will be televised opposite, in part, AMC’s penultimate episode of Breaking Bad. For the first time since the home Betamax videocassette recorder was sold to consumers (including me) in 1977, I’ll be taping the Emmys rather than watching it live.
That’s how much I can’t wait for Breaking Bad.