The Emmy Awards’ ratings are good news/bad news.
Last night’s show, which I thought was mostly dreadful, was the third least watched edition in history. With Cedric the Entertainer not being entertaining at all, the show had 7.4 million viewers on CBS.
The good news is, that’s up 16% from last year. But in 2017, the show had 10.2 million viewers. It’s been downhill ever since.
Last night’s show was poorly written and produced. There was no set, you could see production people running around, there was problems with the Teleprompters.
Also, despite a show full of Black presenters, mostly white people won the awards. It was embarrassing. How Sterling K. Brown does not win Best Actor in “This is Us” is beyond me. And it’s past time that Tracee Ellis Ross and Anthony Anderson won for “Blackish.”
There was also a big upset in that they saved Best Mini Series for the end instead of Best Drama, thinking “Mare of Easttown” would win. But “The Queen’s Gambit” surprised everyone.
CBS used Cedric the Entertainer to host, he’s the star of a pedestrian sitcom called “The Neighborhood,” on their network. He was subpar, and that’s a kind way of saying it. But some of the other sketches — notably the therapy session in which actors griped about not getting Emmys — was embarrassing. Jason Alexander is smarter than that. He should never have been talked into it. I winced for him.
The Emmys have a lot of problems. One of them is that allowing multiple nominees from the same show in same categories knocks out opportunities for other shows. All those nominees from “Ted Lasso,” for example, were ridiculous. There should be one nominee from each show in each category. Too many great performers are excluded because of this.
And speaking of “Ted Lasso,” did we really have to hear Jason Sudeikis say Lorne Michaels was “probably taking a dump”? Does anyone have a filter? And where was CBS? They bleeped so many other things, did they think that was appropriate?
Oh well, at least Jean Smart won. And Debbie Allen made the most beautiful speech of the night. I’m sorry her sister wasn’t there to hear it in person.
