Tuesday, May 3, 2016

Thoughts on the Daytime Emmys 2016

Here are my yearly thoughts on the Daytime Emmy Awards. Below I list the winners and anything else that caught my interest during the 43rd annual awards.

This year we didn't have an actual broadcast show. Red carpet was live on Periscope, though some interviews will be available later. The creative arts show was streamed on Facebook by the Daytime Emmys. Basically it was someone holding a camera phone on a monitor in the back award room. People would come in to get their awards, and we'd see them along with the screen. So parts weren't easy to hear. I wish there was a better lifetime achievement award video for Frank Welker. He's been doing cartoon voices for over 40 years and well deserving of that honor. The craft awards ended at 2:22 am ET, which is insanely late. (Yes I know only in California, but members of the press and some of the nominees do not live in the Pacific time zone. Also there were kids in the crowd and after 11 am is a late end.) There were various red carpet streams on Sunday including the one officially from the Daytime Emmys. During the actual show, Soap Opera Network had someone using periscope from the ballroom. That was the only way to get live footage. I give them thanks even if it wasn't the clearest version of an awards. On Tuesday, the Daytime Emmys people made a video available on YouTube, I edited my post to add it as it has the credits of all the people involved in the production of the program. I've linked it here and have also embedded it.



Now on to the show and the winners...here is a quick list (but in order of importance not including the Spanish programming I'm not familiar with and I don't want to misspell them and they weren't mentioned on the major sites I visited like tvline and ew). With the acting awards, there were all new winners. This is the first time in over 20 years, which is interesting. Sonia Manzano, Maria for "Sesame Street" got the lifetime achievement award. She was on the show for decades and a part of so many people's lives, mine included.

Outstanding Drama Series: "General Hospital" - last year it was Y&R and Days tying.
Outstanding Game Show: "The Price is Right" - last year it was "Jeopardy!"
Outstanding Morning Show: "CBS Sunday Morning" - repeat winner
Outstanding Talk Show/Information: "The Chew" - last year  "Steve Harvey"
Outstanding Talk Show/Entertainment: "The Talk" - last year "The Ellen DeGeneres Show"
Outstanding Entertainment News Show: "Extra" - last year "Entertainment Tonight"
Outstanding Lead Actress Drama: Mary Beth Evans, "Days of Our Lives" - last year Maura West
Outstanding Lead Actor Drama: Tyler Christopher, "General Hospital" - last year Tony Geary
Outstanding Supporting Actress Drama: Jessica Collins, "Y&R" - last year Amelia Heinle
Outstanding Supporting Actor Drama: Sean Blakemore, "GH" - last year Chad Duell
Outstanding Younger Actress Drama: True O'Brien, "Days" - last year Hunter King
Outstanding Younger Actor Drama: Bryan Craig, "GH" - last year Freddie Smith
Oustanding Guest Performer: Obba Babtunde, "B&B" - last year it went to Fred Willard, Ray Wise and Donna Mills and was not on the main show. 
Outstanding Game Host: Craig Ferguson, "Celebrity Name Game" - repeat winner
Outstanding Entertainment Talk Show Host: "Live! with Kelly & Michael" - repeat winner
Outstanding Informative Talk Show Host: Dr. Oz - last year "The Chew" hosts
Outstanding Drama Series/Writing Team: "The Bold and the Beautiful" - repeat winner
Outstanding Drama Series/Directing Team: "General Hospital" - last year "B&B"

At the craft Emmys on Friday night, new approaches drama (now called digital drama) went to "The Bay" who won it last year. There was a best actor and actress award for digital dramas and Kristos Andrews and Mary Beth Evans were the winners. Both are on "The Bay". "Judge Judy" got legal show, and Patricia Heaton's food show won for culinary program. They were so far back in the audience that they had to run to the stage.

This year's was okay and felt like it was a throwback to the show when it was just a lunch broadcast on television in the afternoon. The video is a little bit under 2 hours, there are no musical numbers other than the in memory segment to the song "For Good" from "Wicked".  The only person missing that was glaring to me was Patricia Elliot from "One Life to Live", though I know she probably wasn't the only omission. The end of that mentioned the orchestra at the venue, which was appreciated. There was a clip package at the beginning and later in the show there was a social issues montage, where you could actually hear soap dialogue. The most surprising part about that was the use of a clip from the SIDS story on "Days of Our Lives" from over 30 years ago.

Due to how voting is done for the Daytime Emmys, the winner of the most pre-nomination votes is the ultimate winner of the category. In some categories it wouldn't have made a difference as all of the soaps were nominated for best show, but otherwise that was not the case. When it came to the winners, yes I liked having all new winners. Was it strange how three out of the seven acting awards went to people no longer on their shows? Well, yes, but it isn't unheard of. Vinessa Antoine going on stage for Sean's award was amusing, because he was in flight as he is working on a project outside of LA. Jessica winning and looking so well after having a baby a few months ago, was great too. Of course, what came to mind was how both Jessica and Sean have played characters in the Star Trek universe, and have won Daytime Emmys. True brought her boyfriend Casey up with her, which was kind of amusing. Bryan actually is still on GH, but his blonde hair is jarring. Glad he wrote down who to thank. I liked that Tyler thanked casting director Mark because he had forgotten to do so when he won a soap award in the 90s. Also his tribute to past and former cast members was great, though it was amusing he had the book he received from Stephen Nichols years ago. Mary Beth got a rose from Chris Harrison and went three for three on the weekend. The video above showed the wrong performers for their character description in the lead actress category. (Honestly for people who didn't win, I think Stephen Nichols had the best night as both his former on screen son, and his long time on screen co-star won.) Michael and Kelly didn't appear though were working on Live the next day from New York City. Craig Ferguson wasn't there so his show's producer accepted on his behalf. The Oz family had two winners, with father winning best host and daughter part of the best show award. Of course, Graham Elliot's mentioned of how "The Chew" came to be burns to the soap audience. This was the first time that Frank Valentini got to make a best show speech, which was a long time coming though I wish it had happened at One Life to Live. He thanked both the previous and current writing teams.

Those are my highlights of the Daytime Emmys for this year. I'm glad that since it was luncheon/dinner style clips were shown for the performances. I do wish they had a decent live stream during the event. If science fiction fantasy events and panels from the Paley Center can live stream, the Daytime Emmys not doing the same is a bit shocking. Hopefully next year things will be better in that regard.

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