40 years ago tonight, the big winners at the Emmys were Cheers and Hill Street Blues.
It's no surprise, in retrospect, those shows won the big Comedy and Drama prizes, but I do find the other nominees in that Comedy category interesting:
We mentioned this in our Show Notes post yesterday, but Milton Berle is not in the Texaco special mentioned in our bonus episode this week, but how can you not think of Milton when you think of Texaco Star Theater? So we included this clip in the video playlist:
This is one of those times when Wikipedia summarizes it quite well, but basically Berle shows the SCTV guys no respect, and Genius Winner Joe Flaherty tries to defer to him but can't help snapping back a bit. Miltie didn't really like sharing the spotlight, did he?
What I wonder is, who made Milton Berle the time police? He and Martha Raye are presenters, not the hosts of the ceremony. I guess he just took it upon himself to try to dismiss the next generation of comedy.
Catherine O'Hara remembers this moment in a 2020 Entertainment Weekly piece reflecting on an Emmy win for Schitt's Creek. The story notes that SCTV responded, in a manner, to the incident with a parody sketch the next season that featured Flaherty pummeling a Berle stand-n and telling him he would never ruin another acceptance speech!
Remember that the Emmy Awards broadcast was not just a way to celebrate The Mary Tyler Moore Show each year. It was supposed to be an entertaining television production in its own right. Many times, one way or another, it succeeded. There was a time when the Emmys weren't afraid to be brassier, bolder, and campier than the average piece of network programming. Case in point: This jaw-dropping presentation from the 1985 ceremony:
Mike and I could do an entire bonus episode on this segment (don't think we will rule it out), but for today, here are some of my favorite parts:
*There's Maude! She's just walking across the stage and barely singing, but she's there!
*Who is your favorite non-singer? Is it Ed Asner, who just seems to want to get it over with?
*Or is it Gabe Kaplan, who looks stuck in the ambiguous region between "this is a bit" and "I really don't know what I'm doing here." I can't decide if his expression is supposed to say he's in on some joke (He IS the first non-singer in the medley) or if he has genuine discomfort.
*How about Redd Foxx, who I can't help but think is struggling against every fiber of his being in an effort to keep himself from blurting out a dirty joke.
*Then you have the "really into it" brigade headed by the likes of Linda Lavin and Loretta Swit!
*I think maybe my personal favorite is the charming appearance of Dick Van Dyke.
The whole thing is a glorious piece of TV history climaxing in a bunch of stars standing on stage despite not being part of the medley. What are they all doing there? I would love to see Tony Danza, for example, singing the theme from Taxi. Maybe they saved that moment for the 1986 Emmys.
