At Sunday night’s 67th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards, history was made, with HBO’s Game of Thrones setting a record for most wins ever for a series in a single year and How to Get Away with Murder star Viola Davis, becoming the first African-American actress to win the Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama trophy.
Backstage, Davis told the assembled press about why it took so long for an African American woman to win a best actress Emmy. “When you go to acting school…you just think the sky is the limit in terms of how you can portray a human being. And it’s only when you get out there in your profession that people say…’You’re not cute enough to be a leading lady…You can only be what we define as black.’ I don’t know what that means.” She explained that her character Analise Keating, “was not written as a black woman. I made her black, because I am black,” and she implored writers and other creatives to think outside the box racially.
Her victory came as another African American actress Regina King — winner for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Movie, Miniseries or Limited Series for her work in American Crime — took to the podium backstage. “I wanna curse right now!” she said jubilantly. “What I really wanna say another word for ‘Heck yeah!’ Man, that’s pretty awesome. Her performance…it felt like I was watching an actor’s clinic. Just truly, truly special and moving.”
After years of nominations and no wins, Jon Hamm finally took home the Emmy for Outstanding Actor in a Drama Series for playing Don Draper on Mad Men. He got a standing ovation, something he admitted backstage that he didn’t realize until he’d comically squirmed up to the stage on his belly. “It was a very odd experience…I turned around and realized that people were clapping for me and I was mortified.” Winning in his final year of eligibility for the role, was “It’s been so nice, honestly all of it, over the many, many years we’ve been here, and this is sort of the culmination of that wonderful feeling.”
Equally blown away was Amy Schumer, who saw her Inside Amy Schumer win for Outstanding Variety Sketch Series. “When I won, I thought, ‘I just can’t wait to hug my sister,” she said of her sibling co-writer. “Which is exactly the first thing I did.”
“I was sitting in a separate spot from the writers because I’m really famous,” Schumer deadpanned, “so it was so exciting to see them on stage, and just be like, ‘Oh my God, we’re all such a bunch of dirtbags, it’s really fun that we’re here, and just being so proud of everybody.”
Also backstage, Julia Louis-Dreyfus brought fellow Emmy winner Allison Janney along for support, with the Seinfeld alumna-turned Veep president admitting accepting the award was, “surprisingly nerve-wracking…I will admit it’s not my favorite moment. I prefer playing a part as opposed to that thing.”
Arguably the event’s most emotional moment, however, came from Tracy Morgan. The SNL alum teared up in discussing his comeback from the June, 2014 accident that left him with a traumatic brain injury, and killed his friend James “Jimmy Mack” McNair.
When asked about if the thought of giving up ever crossed Morgan’s mind, he exclaimed, “My wife wouldn’t let me do that. My son wouldn’t let me do that. I look in my little daughter’s face, and they wouldn’t let me do that…His voice raising, he said, “I don’t give up. My father was drafted into Vietnam at 17 and I never seen him give up. So I wanted to be like my father! Even when he had AIDS, he never gave up! So we don’t do that as Morgans!”
Here are the winners in the major categories at the 67th Primetime Emmy Awards, held at the Microsoft Theater L.A. LIVE in Los Angeles on Sunday night:
Drama Series
Game of Thrones
Lead Actress in a Drama Series
Viola Davis, How to Get Away with Murder
Lead Actor in a Drama Series
Jon Hamm, Mad Men
Comedy Series
Veep
Lead Actress in a Comedy Series
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Veep
Lead Actor in a Comedy Series
Jeffrey Tambor, Transparent
Supporting Actor in a Drama Series
Peter Dinklage, Game of Thrones
Supporting Actress in a Drama Series
Uzo Aduba, Orange Is the New Black
Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series
Tony Hale, Veep
Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series
Allison Janney, Mom
Lead Actor in a Limited Series or a Movie
Richard Jenkins, Olive Kitteridge
Lead Actress in a Limited Series or a Movie
Frances McDormand, Olive Kitteridge
Limited Series
Olive Kitteridge
Reality-Competition Program
The Voice
Variety Talk Series
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Variety Sketch Series
Inside Amy Schumer
Source-ABC
