Emmy Live Blog 2011

Arrivals and the Show, All Live-Blogged. Excuse Typos. Things Happen Fast

06:05 This does not bode well, the first arriving guest is a Nina Somebody from The Vampire Diaries who is quite possibly the most boring celebrity I have ever seen interviewed on the red carpet. She had so much airtime to say interesting or funny or quippy or diva things -- trust that you can spin those inane "who are you wearing? can you believe you're here at the emmys?""your career is hothothot" right now volleys whichever way you want. And it was all blah-blah-blah-blah-blah as if pre-recorded and lazily lip-synched to on the red carpet. And when Blake Lively is your aspirational figure that you'll have to work very very hard to deserve a like career. Wow. Let's move on. Please we must. But commercials.

Last year my Oscar dress was amazing. But tonight I wanted to be comfy."

06:15 Celebrities with personalities! Kat Deeley (sp) Lea Michele Taraji P. Henson. Sarah Hyland. Much better. Here's Lea braggin but her Oscar dress while wearing something she claims is comfy but in which she is clearly corseted like Scarlett O'Hara grabbing a bedpost. COMFY!

06:20 Sarah Hyland just had her I'M REALLY A NICE PERSON I SWEAR moment while explaining that she meant no harm when she did an impression of Lea Michele on an episode of Fashion Police. I've heard about this non-scandal but the real scandal is that E! is trying to pretend that that most famous of editorial poses -- elbow jutted out exagerrate contrapposto -- is LEA MICHELE's. I love my Rachel Berry but she wasn't even conceived yet when super-models started doing that. 

6:28 I really am not a Rainn Wilson fan but his carpet banter was funny. His TV crushes?

"The entire cast of Mad Men and the naked Dothraki girl who eats the stallion heart."

Hee.

6:30 Less funny was Paula Abdul's typical spaciness. She said "blueberries" when she meant "blue balls". Even if she'd gotten the word right, is that what you want to talk about on the red carpet?

6:38 Darren Criss's nose should be growing like Pinnochios. He hasn't really even thought about whether or not the Glee cast is graduating this year. Uh, yeah.

6:40 I just caught sight of what looks like a VERY unusual dress on Julianne Marguiles which will undoubtedly get her tons of attention. Will snap a photo as soon as I can. A giant white cylindrical cheese grater? 

6:49 DAMNIT. I was wrong. It is not thick plastic with circular cut-outs but regular old white fabric with big circular looking jewels. Less insane than expected and therefore much uglier. Christina Hendricks on the other hand is bang on beautiful. YUM YUM YUM. 

6:54 Charlize Theron's new "Dior Commercial" is crazy glam explosion and she is ridonculously hot. Like molten hot. If she had been around in Golden Age Hollywood she would have been an enormous star. But Hollywood doesn't understand In Movie Glamour anymore. Only red carpet glamour. Charlize should be looking that good IN a movie.

6:58 This happened awhile ago but I am still haunted...

I bet that's how Ryan kisses all the girls.

MUCH MUCH MORE AFTER THE JUMP

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Stray Emmy Observations (and Supporting Actress)

Raising Hope is Wacky. So is the definition of "GUEST ACTOR"Now that this morning's Emmy nominations have sunk in here's a few things we didn't cover earlier or didn't dig deep enough into in the earlier rundown, largely inspired by your comments.

Guest Actress in a Comedy Series
This is where we are reminded that the Emmys have too many categories and category fraud adjusts to include all of them. How on god's green earth is Cloris Leachman a "guest actress" on Raising Hope when she's a member of the main family and in every single episode? I see her winning with that unfortunate advantage given that the Glee nominees (Gwyneth Paltrow, Kristin Chenoweth, Dot Marie Jones as "Beiste") may cancel each other out and Tina Fey (as host of SNL) is already buried in Emmys. Since I am adamantly opposed to category fraud and since Gwynnie's follow up Glee visits paled in comparison to her first and since Cheno had virtually nothing to do this season, my vote would have to go to Elizabeth Banks for 30 Rock.

Guest Actor & Actress in Drama Series
These categories usually belong to the Law & Order franchise but this year we're blissfully absent of rapists, perverts and victims. Unless some of the characters I'm unfamiliar with qualify and who knows. Three Mad Men made the grade including Cara Buono's jilted businesswoman, Robert Morse ("Cooper" of Sterling Cooper) and everyone's favorite dead woman "Miss Blankenship" (Randee Heller). 

"'Who got an Emmy nod for mouthing off and getting Lafayette laid proper?' I DID, HOOKER"True Blood's Troubles
True Blood which we've been writing about generally gets 3-5 Emmy nominations but last year it added a surprise "Best Drama Series" to its tally. This year it was demoted again with only four nominations for its third season, the one about the V addicted werewolves and the King of Mississippi. The weirdest bit of awards trivia for True Blood though: It has never been nominated for any acting prizes with Emmy (it's won Globes) until now and the person who did it for them is Alfre Woodard who basically only cameo'd in Season 3 as Lafayette's crazy homophobic mama.

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Congratulations to the Critics Choice TV Winners

In progress now but I'm about to leave for a Cars 2 screening -- Vroom Vroom (and wish me luck) -- so I won't know the rest of the winners till later. John Noble (Fringe) won Best Supporting Actor in a Drama Series. Margo Martindale (Justified) and Christina Hendricks (Mad Men) tied for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series and Jon Hamm won Best Actor in a Drama (Mad Men)

The reporters ask Margo about Paris Je T'Aime and it was clear from both the question and the response that that particular gig (courtesy of Alexander Payne) has been fruitful and meaningful for fans and the actress herself.

you can follow a live stream backstage here. My friend Roberta of Basket of Kisses / Mad Men fandom fame, just asked Christina a question!

UPDATE: Here are the winners

• BEST DRAMA Mad Men
• BEST COMEDY Modern Family
• BEST ACTRESS, DRAMA Juliana Marguiles, The Good Wife
• BEST ACTOR, DRAMA Jon Hamm, Mad Men
• BEST ACTRESS, COMEDY Tina Fey, 30 Rock
• BEST ACTOR, COMEDY Jim Parsons, The Big Bang Theory
• BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS, DRAMA (tie) Christina Hendricks, Mad Men & Margo Martindale, Justified
• BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR, DRAMA John Noble, Fringe
• BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS, COMEDY Busy Phillips, Cougar Town
• BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR, COMEDY Neil Patrick Harris, How I Met Your Mother
• BEST TALK SHOW The Daily Show
• BEST REALITY SHOW Hoarders
• BEST REALITY SHOW HOST Mike Rowe, Dirty Jobs
  

This list of winners tells us that the new offshoot of the BFCA is much less concerned about "predicting" the Emmys than the film branch is to predicting the Oscars. Nice to see, don't you think?

Anyway... Ohmygod, I love that scene in Paris Je T'Aime so much and now it's all I can think of so let's watch it again.

Payne, je l'aime.

Links Unchained

Twitch is following the tweets on the casting of Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained. I have to say it's a little disappointing to hear the name Leonardo DiCaprio. One of Tarantino's greatest gifts is finding A list ready performances from B and C listers and if it's DiCaprio AND Will Smith...
Deadline They're always threatening it but it's actually happening again. Craig Brewer hired to reboot Tarzan. I will be crushed, crushed I tell you, if they don't hire an unknown for the ape man.
Pajiba has an open letter to Blake Lively's publicists concerning the nude pics. Very funny. Love the ending.

Awards Daily I was going to post a "Cast This!" game for the proposed Liz & Dick movie from Martin Scorsese, but Sasha beat me to it. I kind of love her second choice: Charlize Theron. Charlize, with dark hair, would make a FAR  more convincing Elizabeth Taylor than Angelina Jolie would, I must say. Just because Jolie is the closest thing we have to Liz in terms of global icon or wealth and glamour with fascinating love life does not mean she really looks like her.
Stirred Straight Up With a Twist Friends of Dorothy (Malone). Teehee
Antagony & Ecstasy on Terrence Malick's Badlands
My New Plaid Pants Quote of the day: Bradley Cooper on Wet Hot American Summer
Stale Popcorn asks a question that does haunt me on occasion: which is the better Marilyn Monroe performance: Bus Stop or The Misfits?
Serious Film I was late linking up to this in the Moulin Rouge! post but it's definitely worth a read. Michael has a push/pull love/hate relationship with Baz Luhrmann's polarizing musical... still!

Off Cinema
TV|Line Mad Men Season 5. The writers are back in the room. Ugh, such a long wait.
Winter is Coming Bitches Hilarious Game of Thrones tumblr
TV|Line Jane Lynch to host the Emmys. 5 things we want to see. I would like to co-sign on #4 (Best in Show related gag) and hoist it up to #1.
Sketchy Details surveys the "Original Score" contenders at the Tony Awards.
Boing Boing which keys on your computer do you hit the most?
Playbill the Spider-Man musical on Broadway owes Julie Taymor tons of funny. See, this is why you pay your bills on time... how embarrassing to have to pay someone who made it such a fiasco after the fact! ;)

And here's the new Robyn video simply because we love her. So should you. And we also love anything that reinforces the potency of the unbroken take; you don't need to cut every .5 seconds to generate visual energy!

There's just something about Robyn's voice. It was created in a beeker labelled "perfect pop star pipes"

Link People

Towleroad a few words about what's out in theaters and about Black Swan's midnight movie plans.
AV Club Chloe Moretz to play La Pfeiffer's daughter in Tim Burton's Dark Shadows..
Movie|Line interviews Barbara Hershey on Black Swan and her new role in Insidious. She also name checks some of her best work. Yay, Hershey.
The Awl a "write in" campaign for a particularly stone faced Best Villain performance at the MTV Movie Awards

My New Plaid Pants "ways not to die" visits Psycho's staircase. Yes, it's been a Psycho heavy week. I blame Manuel Muñoz.
Self Styled Siren one more Elizabeth Taylor tribute but it's wonderful. The Siren always is.
Cinema Blend All Superman movies are coming out in a dvd box set. My fav is #2 of course.

Kneel before General Zod!

Tom Shone reviews Mildred Pierce in full. I didn't finish the article though it was quite good because we're only halfway through but he has interesting things to say on Wood vs. Winslet, with Wood triumphant.
The Fug Girls think this is the best that Liv Tyler has ever looked? What's going on with Liv anyway? Few movie moments of the past decade thrilled me more than her "If you want him, come and claim him" Fellowship of the Ring bit.

Finally, I must thank the fab Lipp Sisters of Basket of Kisses for always keeping us up-to-date on Mad Men news. They are wonderful ladies and good bloggers which is a combo I quite like, don'cha know. A deal has been reached for AMC's flagship show. You can read the details and lots of daily conversations about Mad Men at their fansite. But the nuts and bolts of it is that we get at least two more seasons of the show (it will end with either season six or seven) but we have to wait for March 2012 for Season Five to begin. It'll be so weird not to have Mad Men to fill the space inbetween Oscar seasons.