The 2008 Emmys telecast ended only a few short hours ago, and yet I’m hard-pressed to recall more than a couple specifics about the woeful performances of emcees Tom Bergeron, Jeff Probst, Howie Mandel, Heidi Klum, and Ryan Seacrest (all of whom were nominated for Best Host for a Reality or Reality-Competition Show).
Sure, there was the initial shock when the five highly paid professionals opened the show with neither a single funny joke nor an effort to cut to the trophy-fest proceedings with businesslike brevity; instead, the quintet just stood around, shooting the breeze like bored strangers at a bad trade-show awards dinner, waiting for the buffet line to open. Then there was the general feeling of queasiness when Bergeron and William Shatner ripped off Klum’s tear-away tuxedo, the former supermodel’s shriek of shock just a little too convincing. (Yes, like Nina Garcia, I question the gag’s taste level.) Other than those opening moments (and Probst gamely trying, but failing, to survive a set piece that put him in an old-tyme gumshoe costume), however, what else did the hosting panel do that couldn’t have been handled by a trophy kiosk and an unseen voice-over announcer?
No joke, by the time I turned off my set at 11:01 p.m., it wouldn’t have taken much to convince me that Seacrest had left the Nokia Theatre after the first 30 minutes of the show, only coming back long enough to find out he’d lost out to Probst in his division. (Seriously, has anyone ever seen the American Idol host so…muzzled?) Mandel, meanwhile, could’ve used a muzzle, as every one of his attempted punchlines fell to the stage with a thud louder than Bergeron dropping Klum like a mannequin to show the difference between comedy and drama.
I know, I know…hosting a big, nationally televised awards show is no easy gig, especially not with all the armchair emcees second-guessing you the morning after. But when a five-person emcee squad manages to get upstaged by the ten-thousandth airing of that (still hilarious) Tina Fey-Martin Scorsese American Express ad, it’s time to rethink your strategy. I know I’m not alone, as Neil Patrick Harris and Jeremy Piven couldn’t wait till the end of the show to express their annoyance (see clips below). Are you with me, or did you feel differently about the Klum-Bergeron-Probst-Mandel-Seacrest tag team?
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I have to say Heidi and Howie Mandell were the best of the emmy hosts. Jeff Probst always comes off too telepromptory and Howie…can u get any more annoying? Loved when Neil Patrick Harris slammed him.
Oh my God, it was painful! Actually painful! Especially that opening…I mean what was that?!
But I feel like I can’t just blame the hosts, were they not given ANY script? Any jokes or skits or ideas given to them? It’s like they were just told go out there and wing it for the whole show. The only thing funny coming from them was the zingers they evoked from other actors!
I actually feel bad for them, they must be so embarrassed.
those guys (and gal) were a joke (and i DON’T mean they were funny)…
“Uma, Oprah. Oprah, Uman.” It’s more god awful than David Letterman’s ill-fated Oscars host night. Nevr again, Emmys.
They should have just had Ricky Gervais host the rest of the show. David Brent vs. Michael Scott could have made the show 100000000000 times better.
for me that just made it even more apparent that american idol is nr 1 thanks to paula and simon, and Not thanks to seacrest. They are entertaining, he is not. where were they anyway?? i bet they were so bored last year that they decided to skip it this year. anyway, thats the only one I can comment on because thats the only one of those 5 shows I watch.
The only enjoyable part of the emmys was Josh…..such a waste of watching hours.
Hard to decide which was more painful to sit through. The aimless embarrassing opening, or the Josh Groban medley.
Overall, easily the worst Emmy show I ever saw.
The reality nominees did a horrible job hosting. Embarrassing to watch with Howie Mandell being the worst offender.
I’d rather watch paint peel than to watch snobish opinionated self absorbed egomaniacs praise each other’s mediocre
talents. Who cares which celebrities were placed on pedestals?
If they had to face one week of the real world 3/4 of them would commit suicide.
It was a waste of 4 minutes of air time and NPH and Jeremy Piven were right to bash it. Ryan Seacrest, Probst, Mandel, Klum and the other guy were just terrible. Ricky Gervais was the gem of the night. Someone let him host the Oscars next year.
Heidi was the tallest. That made me laugh. She’s gorgeous, so while the idiots said nothing for 12 minutes I just stared at her. The Laugh In bit was also bad. And Tina Fey & Amy Poehler should have hosted. Their bit was funny. So was Ricky G’s too.
The hosts were very sad, ecspecially Howie who, by all accounts, is THE only actual comedian. At least he could’ve tried and done some old school laughs by saying “what”, “what”, “what” with his usual open palm-hand expression. I would have at least laughed then.
I think I would’ve just done the “Plug-Your-Own-Network” move and had Bergeron host. Heidi did a good job too, but the other three were brutal.
Can we just hand out the awards and cut the crap next year? It was awful.
love to see heidi and jeff. howie over-acts. tom and ryan is just safe.
*sigh* Who else could use the word “prattling” so effectively? Ricky Gervais, NPH and prunes – I’m actually glad I had to go to bed to get ready for chemo today instead of forcing myself to stay up and watch til the bitter end. Because, like Steve Martin said, I too used to run home from school and play “6oth Emmy show”. Dammit, I should have been playing “Vice President debates”.
I agree, Ricky Gervais should host next years award show. He was hilarious, the others were so boring I almost turned it off in the beginning.
Did the producers not watch last year? Did they not see how awful Seacrest was? Why bring him back? Give us Conan, Ellen, Tina Fey, Jon Stewart-anyone else next years Emmys, just don’t make us suffer through the Seacrest again.
My new campaign:
Neil Patrick Harris
Emmy Host’09.
The reality hosts were HORRID!
there are no words for how god awful the opening several minutes were, the worst hosting idea of an award show ever! Don Rickles was hilarious pointing out how lame the jokes are on the cue cards, he and Gervais were the only bits worth watching
Who produced this show? Did they have any input into the choice of hosts? Worst hosting I’ve ever witnessed. It was embarrassing to watch. Please don’t ever do something like that again!
When a Josh Groban medley becomes the highlight of a show within a medium specifically designed to ENTERTAIN, then you know all of TV is in trouble. It’s a joke that a reality show person and an ex-super model host anything on TV, let alone have another talk show type open the show to begin with. Makes award shows the worst ‘reality’ TV. Whatever happend to TV anyway? It’s trite, sad, and bad not to mention irrelevant all at once.
Ricky Gervais should be the host next year (or maybe Ricky Gervais AND Hugh Laurie). Wit,intelligence and humor were sadly missing from last night’s hosts. Don’t even get me started about the rapid descent into bad burlesque that Frau Kloom embarked upon….
Deal?? – No Deal!!! I hope that this fiasco will prompt the networks into contemplating the cancellation of at least a dozen “reality” shows.
I kept waiting for the payoff of those five standing there like robots. Sadly, it never came. And it was woefully predictable that Heidi wasn’t going to stay in that drab black tux for very long. Embarrassing. And I loved the comment I read somewhere, that Oprah must have been “…taking elocution lessons from Madonna…” Hilarious. Was that you, Slezak?
oh man… the emmy’s was such a snorefest that i stopped watching 30 minutes into it. i’m glad so many people agreed with me.
The reality hosts sucked. They should not have even been on the show or even nominated. What a stupid category. They ruined the show.
The worse thing was how they cut off someone right in the middle of praising John Adams and the founding fathers of our country… for more prattling time.
Why bother giving awards to the people if you won’t let them give their speeches?
It didn’t make any sense to have nominees hosting anyway. But the thing that kept bugging me was this: How is “Deal Or No Deal” a reality-competition show? It’s a game show! American Idol & Survivor are reality-competition shows. Howie Mandel shouldn’t even have been nominated in this category.
To PS – they didn’t cut him off because for time, they cut him off to censor blatant political speech…it’s as if Smothers’s speech never happened.