We watch... so you don't have to.
I Watched All Thirty Hours of the 2003 Emmys and All I Got Was This Stupid Station Break
I've never really completely understood Einstein's theory of relativity, but tonight, for the first time, I suddenly grasped it with perfect clarity. Time does indeed stretch relative to the observer's frame of reference; especially when that observer is watching the annual Emmy presentations. It's just a pity that relativity doesnât simultaneously stretch the pain threshold.
Jesus Christ, that was a long show! As 11 o'clock approached, I thought relief was at hand. Never before have I so eagerly anticipated our horrible local news coverage. But 11:00 came and went, with no talking heads in sight and four more awards yet to be announced. At 11:13, Mike Myers finally bid the groggy audience farewell, and I was shocked when I glanced at the date on my watch and discovered that the spirits had done it all in one night. And here I thought Iâd missed Christmas.
Because my cerebrum shut down shortly after the seventeenth "lots of Gubernatorial candidates" joke, leaving the pons and midbrain to fend for themselves, I don't remember much about the proceedings. However, a few scattered thoughts have managed to emerge from the haze:
- Taking three hours to build up the drama for the presentation of the "big awards" loses a lot of its impact when you then have only thirty seconds left in which to present all six of them.
- Turning one host into ten hosts does not necessarily make an awards show ten times as funny as in previous years. In most cases it makes the show exactly as unfunny, but ten times as sad.
- Playtex Bras as a major sponsor of this year's Emmys: inadvertent irony, or brilliant marketing synergy?
- I like it a lot when comedians stand in front of an Emmy audience and caustically savage television for being witless and vulgar. Emmy audiences don't seem to like it very much, though.
- What was up with The Cos'? First he busts on Wanda Sykes for butchering the Queen's English, then he gets up on stage to accept his humanitarian award and proceeds to ramble about everything but; including a thoroughly pathetic reminiscence about his dead son, Ennis, whom he apparently still speaks of in the present tense. Perhaps all that exposure to kids saying darned things has finally turned his brain to pudding in a cloud.
- Does anybody else think that the way that Sprint PCS guy hangs around with America's housewives whenever the menfolk go out of town is just a little bit creepy?
- I'd like to think that the reason Joe Pantoliano suddenly got all teary when he approached the microphone for his acceptance speech was that he got a good look at his outfit in the monitors.
- The traditional part of the show where the Chairman of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences comes out to congratulate himself reminds me of any official presentation made by Commissioner of Baseball, Bud Selig. I get the impression that the audience is holding its collective breath, silently praying that he doesnât say something to embarrass their entire industry.
- Was Martin Sheen off taking a dump when they announced the Best Drama win for The West Wing, or do they have some kind of special box in the back for guys who play the President?
- Seriously, about the bra thing... I'm all for ladies going unsupported, but if your boobs are so small that they could be adequately covered by the spaghetti straps on your gown, going sans-brassiere isn't going to do your cleavage any favors. I haven't seen so many well dressed boards since my sixth grade field trip to the lumberyard.
