Kenan Thompson's Emmys Opener Will Haunt My Nightmares
When a top-hatted Kenan Thompson flickered onto my screen calling himself “The Mayor of Television,” I knew we were in for a rough Emmys opener. But reader, I didn’t think it could get this rough. Maybe the Emmys are afraid of getting political this year, or maybe they’ve just run out of ideas. Maybe they’re worried about someone getting slapped! Whatever the case, I’d prefer a toothless topical monologue to the cringefest we got instead.
Here’s the bit: in an ode to “legally cleared” TV theme songs, the Emmys set familiar themes to song and dance. It all started with a milquetoast rendition of the Friends theme featuring colorful umbrellas (Tom Holland did it better), then moved into a yassified version of The Brady Bunch. The surviving cast members of The Brady Bunch showed up, beaming at a private table—which was nice to see, even if they had to watch their show be desecrated. Then, it all took a dark turn when Thompson and his dancers started grooving to the Law & Order theme in a dark copaganda dream ballet. But it’s the Game of Thrones segment that will really haunt me—dozens of men wielding weapons and grunting as if they were in some sort of tortured Mulan homage, with Thompson marching out to dab in a Daenerys Targaryen wig. I can’t unsee it.
If you told me that the whole routine was actually a visiting production of “Television History On Ice,” I would believe you. It was all so bad that they had to bring out a television legend to clean up the mess: Oprah Winfrey, who presented the first award of the night to Michael Keaton.
Before he burst into song and dance, Thompson said, “TV is all we have, from Netflix and chill, to Paramount+ and eating dinner alone.” Don’t knock Paramount+ and eating dinner alone until you’ve tried it, Kenan—they have Star Trek over there! I’d take Paramount+ and eating dinner alone over that opening number any day.
You Might Also Like
