Although he didn’t take home any hardware for his final season of his talk show Conan, the legendary late night host Conan O’Brien had an absolute field day at the ceremony, at one point derailing the show with his antics.
During the introduction for Chairman and CEO of the Television Academy Frank Scherma, O’Brien leaped to his feet and gave him a wild, howling standing ovation that fell somewhere in the gray area between parody and outright heckling. O’Brien’s antics were contagious, triggering an actual standing ovation from the crowd, who stood as O’Brien shouted “Yes!” even as Scherma made his way to the mic. Scherma seemed amused, if a bit confused by the reception, but went along with it as best he could, pausing his remarks so that O’Brien could shower him with affection from afar. At the end of the ovation, O’Brien delivered a presidential salute to Scherma before returning to his seat. While the moment didn’t exactly translate on television, the crowd at the event seemed to love O’Brien’s bit.
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And he didn’t stop there. O’Brien also made his way on to the stage as his fellow late night host Stephen Colbert accepted the award for outstanding variety special for his 2020 election night special, Stephen Colbert’s Election Night 2020: Democracy’s Last Stand Building Back America Great Again Better 2020. O’Brien stood behind Colbert arm in arm with The Late Show writing team, accepting an award he had nothing to do with. “Most of the people behind me really deserve this Emmy right now,” Colbert said, cheekily. The Emmy for most beloved ceremony clown absolutely goes to Conan O’Brien.
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