If you have ever enjoyed “Saturday Night Live,” you most likely would have enjoyed this Monday’s live broadcast of the 70th Primetime Emmy Awards. Many familiar faces from SNL’s past and present were in attendance and made the night feel like an elegant broadcast of the weekend’s biggest sketch comedy show.
The hosts were “Weekend Update” anchors, Michael Che and Colin Jost. However, they didn’t start off the show — Kate McKinnon, Kenan Thompson, John Legend, Kristen Bell and other talented artists sang “We Solved It.” In classic SNL humor, the song sarcastically boasted about this year’s nominees list having been deemed the most diverse in the history of the awards show.
“I actually thought it was really enjoyable compared to previous years,” Rohani Sharma, a senior computer science major said. “When a show wins I’m more inclined to watch it because winning an Emmy is like a stamp that the show is good.”
But, the most memorable moment of the night was when Glenn Weiss, an American producer and director, won his Emmy for directing the Oscars. When the camera panned to the audience, most of their jaws dropped and they cheered as he proposed to his girlfriend, Jan Svendsen, on stage. This was after Weiss started his speech with a tear-jerking tribute to his late mother, who had passed away only two weeks before his win.
Che honored talented artists that had been neglected because of their race in his pre-recorded, funny, yet heartwarming bit “Emmy Reparations.” In this, Che mentions he “stole” the Emmys from Bill Cosby, a four-time winner and gave them to overlooked talents such as Tichina Arnold from “Everybody Hates Chris” and Jaleel White, the actor who played Steve Urkel from “Family Matters” and other deserving artists.
The big winners of the night were “Game of Thrones,” “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” “Saturday Night Live,” “The Crown,” “The Assassination of Gianni Versace,” “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “The Americans.” Netflix left with the most awards for the night, with seven total wins. HBO was a close second with six total wins while Amazon Prime and FX Networks tied with five wins.
“I typically watch more shows on cable networks like HBO and Showtime, but have yet to see any of Amazon’s shows so I hadn’t heard of ‘The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’ before the Emmys — that’s one I’m definitely inclined to watch,” Rachel Rodriguez, communications manager for the College of Arts and Sciences, said. “I also want to watch ‘The Assassination of Gianni Versace’ — so many great actors were featured in that series.”