Emmys 2024: The Biggest Moments, Snubs & Surprises

Lynette Rice
·5-min read

A night of nostalgia, a Baby Reindeer sweep and an incredible launching pad for the upcoming seasons of The Bear and Shōgun made up the 76th annual Primetime Emmys on Sunday.

While the Family Levy didn’t exactly rock the L.A.’s Peacock Theater as the first father-and-son hosts, breakout moments came courtesy of TV’s old guard (yey, Candy Bergen!) and Jodie Foster’s first Emmy win.

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Here are some of the great moments, surprises and snubs from tonight’s telecast on ABC.

Great moment when Eugene Levy made a crack about The Bear‘s record wins in the comedy category and how, well, it’s hardly a knee-slapping series. “In the true spirit of The Bear we will not be making any jokes.”

Surprise when Martin Short, Steve Martin and Selena Gomez came out right after the Levy opening monologue and showed us how to really make the Emmy audience laugh at the top of the show. (Take this little zinger from Martin when explaining how he converses with actors he doesn’t recognize: “I loved your scene with Nicole Kidman.”)

Snub when Billy Crudup took the first assumed-for-Shōgun Emmy in the supporting drama actor category. The immediate thought was that votes for Takehiro Hira and Tadanobu Asano canceled each other out and gave Crudup the win. Whatever; it was worth hearing him take the stage and call out his “eye candy” wife, Naomi Watts.

Surprise when The Bear‘s Liza Colón-Zayas won her first Emmy, beating out grand dames Meryl Streep (who everyone expected to win) and Carol Burnett (who everyone thought would win). It’s magical when the TV Academy defies expectations and actually honors the well-deserved underdogs.

Great moment when Murphy Brown‘s Candice Bergen joked about how “today a Vice President would never attack a woman for having kids, so my work here is done. Meow!”

Surprise how it never fails to shock that The Good Wife’s Eli Gold, er, Alan Cumming, has a bonnie Scottish accent.

Great moment when Kathy Bates joined Antony Star and Giancarlo Esposito on stage to represent TV villains and brought down the house with these yuks: “You know how hard it was to get a date after Misery? And my American Horror Story was forgetting to thank Ryan Murphy after I won my Emmy.”

Snub to Seth Meyers, who finally got another nomination in Best Talk Series, only to lose out to perennial favorite Jon Stewart, who returned part-time to The Daily Show this year. Someday, ol’ buddy. Someday.

Great moment when Billy Crystal took stage and riffed for a bit about appearing on Johnny Carson before getting down to business, introducing the nominees for Best Talk Series. He then launched into a brilliant gag in which he read entries from his personal diary about all the times he appeared on the nominees’ shows. (Sample joke: “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Brilliant guy, but I wonder if he’s ever seen himself naked.”) Crystal, we will never quit you.

Swipe to the actor Will Smith after the writer Will Smith won an Emmy for writing for Slow Horses and make this quip, “Despite my name, I come in peace.”

Awkward moment between Ebon Moss-Bachrach and Taylor Zakhar Perez at a bar with a bottle of Johnnie Walker (painful product placement? Your guess is as good as ours) before introducing the Writing for the Limited or Anthology Series or Movie category.

Disappointing surprise that instead of cutting to the traditional camera after In Memoriam, the Emmys brought out Jimmy Kimmel who made an off-color joke about dead people winning something before sharing a few more factoids about the late Bob Newhart. This is the best they could do with Kimmel?

Great moment during the oh-so-small Happy Days reunion (You got Richie Cunningham. So where’s Potsie and Ralph?) when Henry Winkler got the old jukebox going by punching it — just like the Fonz used to do.

Painful moment when I realized that — after the “coaches” matchup of Brendan Hunt and Jane Lynch — this gimmick of bringing old TV characters to the stage was starting to outstay its welcome.

But then Surprise! Jimmy Smits, Don Johnson and Niecy Nash-Betts took the stage for a cop reunion, followed by Viola Davis, Christine Baranski and Gina Torres for a lawyer reunion, so all was good in the world again.

Great moment when Jodie Foster earned a standing ovation for winning her first Emmy for True Detective: Night Country.

Smack Upside the Head to Bradley Whitford, who kind of ruined the reunion of The West Wing by tweeting before the show that he wouldn’t be on stage with Martin Sheen, Allison Janney, Richard Schiff, Dulé Hill and Janel Maloney to give the Best Drama Emmy to Shōgun.

Great moment in the Outstanding Comedy category. Where to start? First, presenter Catherine O’Hara said she was “shocked and excited” to be announcing this year’s Best Comedy Series winner, before ripping up the card over how wrong it was to honor just one comedy. And then…

SNUB ON STEROIDS! Hacks — an actual comedy — won the big prize, not The Bear. No, chef! Not this year.

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