The relative success or failure of the Emmy Awards can often be traced back to their host, and a high note was set early on at the 2024 Emmys with the father-son duo of Eugene and Dan Levy treating us to a show that was well-paced and studded with genuinely funny moments—from Martin Short and Steve Martin joking about Nicole Kidman’s small-screen omnipresence (Martin: “When I see an actor I don’t know, I just say, ‘I loved your scene with Nicole Kidman,’ and 9 times out of 10, I’m right!”) to Jean Smart poking fun at HBO while accepting her sixth Emmy. Below, find seven of the very best moments from this year’s Emmys ceremony:
The Saturday Night Live-alum tribute (of sorts) to Lorne Michaels
We’re always happy to see any combination of Maya Rudolph, Kristen Wiig, Bowen Yang, and Seth Meyers, and their joking tribute to Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels’s many Emmy losses (and, as Meyers pointed out, not-insubstantial number of wins) had the stage-confident, quippy energy of a really good SNL sketch. I love even the suggestion that Yang thinks Michaels’s name is “Lauren.”