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Emmy glory for TV's best
20/09/2004 07:31 - (SA)
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| Meryl Streep laughs backstage with her trophy for outstanding lead actress in a miniseries for her role in Angels in America. (Reed Saxon, AP) |
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Los Angeles - Mob hit The Sopranos strong-armed its way to success at the annual Emmy awards on Sunday, while Sex and the City heroine Sarah Jessica Parker finally hooked up with a long-awaited best comedy actress statuette.
The biggest winner of the night was the star-studded mini-series Angels in America - a television adaptation of Tony Kushner's Pulitzer Prize-winning play about the Aids crisis of the 1980s, which ended the night with a record-matching 11 awards.
The Sopranos, which had 20 nominations going in to the ceremony at the Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium, grabbed the best drama series Emmy that many felt to be overdue, as well as best supporting drama actor and actress awards for on-screen couple Michael Imperioli and Drea de Matteo.
It was the first-ever best drama win for a cable show, on a night that saw HBO underline its dominance over the broadcast networks.
"I might puke, choke, cry or die, and you've already seen me do that," said De Matteo, whose character Adriana was sensationally "whacked" in the last season of the mafia family saga.
Last chance for old favourites
Sopranos stars James Gandolfini and Edie Falco failed to repeat their wins of last year, with the best drama actor and actress awards going to James Spader of the ABC legal series The Practice and Allison Janney, of NBC's presidential hit The West Wing.
One of the loudest cheers of the evening was reserved for Parker, for whom this was the last chance at a best comedy actress award, with Sex and the City having wrapped up its sixth and final season.
"This is great punctuation for the end of a long sentence," said Parker, brandishing her Emmy which, after five years of missing out, she declared "well worth the wait".
Parker's co-star, Cynthia Nixon, took the best supporting actress award.
Another much loved series making its final awards bow, Frasier, garnered best comedy actor and supporting actor Emmys for Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce.
"In sitcom school, they tell you how great it is to have a long-running show, but they don't tell you how hard it is to say goodbye," said Hyde Pierce.
There was no farewell prize for the most popular sitcom of recent years, Friends, which failed to win in any of the major categories.
To the new generation
In a nod to the new generation, Fox's Arrested Development, making its debut awards appearance, was the surprise winner of the best comedy series gong.
Angels in America swept the mini-series category, including best director for Mike Nicholas and best writer for Kushner, who used his acceptance speech to lay down a personal marker on the gay marriage debate.
"Thanks to my wonderful husband Mark," he said. "Some day soon we can get a legal marriage licence and you can make an honest homosexual of me."
The show also garnered awards for big names more accustomed to gracing the Emmys' big-screen cousin, the Oscars, with Hollywood stalwarts Al Pacino and Meryl Streep picking up the category's best actor and actress awards.
"You know there are days when I myself think I am overrated... but not today," joked Streep, who took a friendly dig at her co-nominated co-star Emma Thompson "who will hold a grudge for the rest of her life. But who cares"?
Veteran comedienne Elaine Stritch offered a similarly dry take on the traditional acceptance speech when she won for best performance in a variety, music or comedy program.
"Look at the company I'm in. Just look at it," Stritch said of her fellow nominees. "And I'm so glad none of them won."
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