It’s not often that one comes away from an awards show thinking the awards were all well-deserved and that the show was frequently amusing, but that’s the way the Emmys went. Sometimes surprising winners and moments (Tracy Morgan returning to TV, and to present the Best Drama award!), and not excessively boring (the telecast even ended a minute early!), it was a fine Sunday night, especially if you were in any way associated with Game of Thrones, Veep, Olive Kitteridge, and … The Voice!
If there could be said to be an upset, it was undoubtedly the triumph of Game of Thrones over the final season of Mad Men in numerous categories. But who could begrudge GoT after seasons of neglect? You could argue that this wasn’t Thrones’s strongest season, and that Mad Men went out excellently, but that’s a familiar characteristic of Emmy history, and, really, I was just glad to see Jon Hamm finally get his acting Emmy. I was also equally glad to see the Writing, Directing, and Supporting-Actor awards GoT walked away with. It was a nice birthday present for George R.R. Martin.
The Veep sweep was also one to be savored. The show took a risk this past season in moving Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s Selina Meyer up a notch in job description, and it worked out beautifully as an artistic strategy. And, as it turned out, as an awards-attractor, including the fourth consecutive win for Louis-Dreyfus.
It was indeed a night of sweeps in each major genre, since Olive Kitteridge dominated the movie/miniseries category as well. I was kind of shocked that the gravely austere, deadpan Kitteridge prevailed over the much showier Bessie — it was one of the rare times in Emmy history in which the most artistically discrete creation prevailed.
Andy Samberg proved a surprisingly charming and not-surprisingly funny host. His opening, taped segment about catching up on a year’s worth of TV-watching was superbly crafted, crammed with TV shows and laughs, as was his Mad Men-finale sketch: “Emmys Can Kill” killed. Samberg made a couple of nicely wicked True Detective jokes, and also tossed off some terrific, written-on-the-fly jokes, such as pretending disappointment when Jon Hamm won Best Drama Actor: “I was pullin’ [Kyle] Chandler—[I] dig that dude.”