I Really Enjoyed Friday's Critics Choice Awards - And I'm Not Just Talking About the Winners for TV

 

As I acknowledged in the introduction to my predictions in my article Wednesday I expected the mood for the 2025 Critics Choice Awards to be somber. After all, considering that they had been postponed because of the wildfires that did so much damage to LA over the last month as well as the understandable depression that was no doubt among Hollywood considering the aftermath of November’s election, I wasn’t expecting anybody to be in a mood to celebrate.

To be sure Chelsea Handler, emceeing for the third consecutive year, opened the show with a statement about the fire fighters and first responders, a code to raise money for those disenfranchised and several members of the crew were seating front and center. And as you might expect, nearly every major winner went out of their way to pay tribute to them though in this case they were no doubt more sincere than so many of the other speeches. But from the opening monologue on Handler went out of her way to make sure everybody, at least for a few hours, could forget what was going on in the world around them and she did so in her entertaining way.

Handler went out of the way to say that this was the third straight year she’d hosted “which makes this second longest relationship I’ve had in my life.” The first was when she worked for E!, which had taken over broadcasting duties where she had various jobs over the past decade. She mentioned her relationship with former head Ted Sarandos – “that was back when sleeping with your boss was cool,” she said to great laughter. And then went in for the kill. “Back then I was the only woman hosting a late night show. And look how far we’ve come. These days the only way a woman can host late night is if Hacks writes a storyline about it.”

From that point on Chelsea was her usually ribald, hysterical self, puncturing the political situation with her usual great wit. She said Janelle James was so good in Abbott Elementary she should be the next Secretary of Education, talked about how Netflix combatted anti-Semitism “by having Kristen Bell penetrated by a sexy rabbi”, went out of her way to compliment Nicole Kidman’s great musical performance in Babygirl multiple times and showed her huge attraction to Ralph Fiennes. “You’ve played a sadistic Nazi, a genocidal wizard and a gossipy cardinal and somehow I still wanted to have sex with all three of them.” She praised Fiennes but told him “never to play Vladimir Putin…I don’t want to have to go through that weekend again.” She complimented Shogun “I love reading my TV”, and the makeup team for The Penguin “now we know how much work it takes to make Colin Farrell look un f—able”. Yet again I came away wondering how come Chelsea doesn’t host every possible awards show – or if she and Nikki Glaser could team up for the next Golden Globes.

This spirit of extreme hilarity was shown through so many of the presenters, which were as much in pairs as anything else. Justine Lupe and Kristen Bell co-presented an award and went out of their way to mention the critics remarks they had received over the years: Lupe doing the laudatory ones; Bell the derogatory ones. “And we respect each of them equally,” Bell assured us. David Harbour and Kathryn Hahn presented Best Actress in a Limited Series by noting the awards had turned 30 but that they were not a boomer – and then went out of their way to use every bit of ridiculous and no doubt real Gen Z slang to prove they weren’t. Alison Tolman presented an award for comedy when asked if comedy was like riding a horse by describing what riding a horse was like for in great detail. Matt Bomer came out to present Best Actress in a drama by listing bizarre things: “A plastic surgeon who had a human face transferred to a cat” and then saying,  “These are just some of the people living in my house right now and have nothing to do with the nominated actresses in this category.”

But as always it was a lot of fun when Natasha Lyonne came out to present the awards for writing and went off with a wonderful tangent about original screenplays. “You know, they say there are no original movies out there and I say: Yidish, ridicky, manty” because my trademark line on Poker Face is considered too obscene for primetime.” I’m honestly not sure what I would like more: the next season of Poker Face or for Lyonne to host an awards show – any awards show.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from the winners, which were the typical Critics Choice combinations of going pretty much as expected and delightful surprises. So I’ll go through them by each major category.

It came as no real shock to anyone that Shogun was the biggest winner of the night, taking for awards in the Drama. What came as a shock to myself was which four awards. I was hardly shocked when the series took Best Drama and one of the recipients said, “My first movie had a six percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, so I remember the Critics.”  Hiroyuki Sanada’s win for Best Actor was hardly unexpected and though I didn’t predict it, it didn’t come as a huge shock to me that Tadanobu Asano took Best Supporting Actor. (He was one of two major absences in the winners.) But I was stunned to see that Moeka Hoshi prevailed for Best Supporting Actress. She was stunned too – and then won everybody in the crowd over with her delightful speech thanking everyone, giving appreciation to the fire fighters and saying that she “hoped her English was good enough.”

But that was a ripple compared to the tidal wave when Best Actress in a Drama was announced and for the first time this year, it wasn’t Anna Sawai but rather Kathy Bates. Bates was stunned beyond belief and by the time she got to the stage the entire crowd was delivering a standing ovation. Bates first thanked Sawai (Sawai had done the same to Bates at the Golden Globes) and then went out of her way to thank producer Eric Christian Olsen, the entire cast including Skye Marshall and then gave a special tribute to the firefighters. Olsen was one of those who lost his home in the fires and he didn’t have one, so Bates dedicated her award to him – and said it was going to be there. Bates’ now takes on the role of frontrunner for next years Best Actress in a Drama Emmy and it is possible the show will contend for Best Drama itself.

Best Comedy basically went as I predicted it. Hacks was the biggest winner, taking Best Comedy, Best Actress for Jean Smart and Best Supporting Actress for Hannah Einbinder. Smart wasn’t present but she had a good excuse. When the series won the grand prize Paul Downs accepted saying that he’d written a speech on his phone but his phone was dead “and after Tony Kushner gave a pass at it.” He then went out of his way to thank the Critics for helping Hacks find its place and niche early on, everyone at Max, his creative team and partners, most of whom were finishing up Season 4. He then pointed out most of the show was shot in LA and he was told how lucky they were to shoot there – and then called out that this was an industry town and more shows should be shot there. This was a call to arms in a way and a revival for an industry that has been struggling out of Hollywood and I truly hope the studios listen.

Einbinder’s speech, like all the ones for Supporting awards, was given in tangent with the Best Supporting Actor award in the category. To my surprise – and delight – the winner for Supporting Actor was Michael Urie for Shrinking. Both Urie and Einbinder of proud members of the LGTBQ+ community and almost as if it were arranged they both spent the first twenty seconds thanking everybody, including members of that community who were under assault. Urie’s speech was more heartfelt and hysterical – he referred to Harrison Ford “as a brilliant young up and comer” and also more endearing when it came to his sexuality. Einbinder’s speech was more deliberately political – it dealt with climate change – but considering how much of what happened in LA is no doubt a result of it, it was hard to argue against not point it out. Besides Einbinder has earned it.

As expected Adam Brody won Best Actor in a Comedy for Nobody Wants This and his speech was the most cheerful going out of his way to thank Kristen Bell, Erion Foster and his wife Leighton Meester. Brody was already a frontrunner for the Emmy this fall and this cements it. Urie will move up to the contenders, though he will have stiff competition from that young up and comer Harrison Ford.

Best Limited Series was a delightful mix of the past and the future. As I expected Baby Reindeer won Best Limited Series though Richard Gadd wasn’t present. Jessica Gunning spoke for him saying that he was busy shooting a new series “for HBO and BBC airing soon.” And that “I’ve always had a deep respect for critics which I hope they will show for my new series for HBO and BBC airing soon.” Gunning took what may be her last Best Supporting Actress trophy in the cycle.

But for the rest of the awards the Critics Choice was clearly of the future. Colin Farrell took his second Best Actor prize for his work in The Penguin. His speech was, if anything, more heartfelt than the one at the Golden Globes again joking about the makeup, this time talking about the directors of the show who he’d ignored the last time, giving by far the most heartfelt and dedicated speech about the firefighters and their bravery  and closing my speaking about the work of the producer. He went out of his way to talk about the two major crises that he had to undergone as part of playing Oz Cobb: Covid which had crippled the production of The Batman and the strikes in Hollywood in 2023 which delayed the production of The Penguin. He made it clear that the producers put the staff and creative forces first in both cases and made sure that every one of them matter. Barring a seismic shift in forces Farrell is now the odds-on favorite to win the Emmy in Best Limited Series this fall.

And in an even more delightful surprise Cristin Milioti took a well-deserved Best Actress prize for her incredible work as Sofia Falcone. She may very well have been shocked – Jodie Foster was the favorite in this category as she was at the Golden Globes – but no one denies that Milioti absolutely deserved to win in one of the greatest roles of all of 2024. Hopefully Milioti – and indeed The Penguin itself – are now the out and front runners for all major awards in Limited Series next year. (I’m going to be covering some of the other guild nominees and winners later this week so I’ll let you know how it win.)

In what was clearly a shock even to him Best Supporting Actor was Liev Schreiber for his performance in The Perfect Couple. Schreiber has been a great performer in TV for more than a decade but even was shocked by this. The first person he thanked was his son: “for encouraging me to go because I didn’t think for a moment I’d win.” He went out of his way to thank his co-stars including Nicole Kidman and Dakota Fanning. Considering how many of the nominees in this category were from shows that aired in the 2023-2024 season we will have to wait and see whether this is a foreshadowing of things to come – or just a fluke.

Though they weren’t presented on stage I was right about three of the smaller awards. X-Men 97 won Best Animated Series, Squid Game won Best International Series and Ali Wong won Best Comedy Special as she did at the Golden Globes. I was wrong about The Daily Show winning Late Night but I’m more than fine with John Mulaney winning instead, particularly because he was shortchanged by the Emmys last year.

The awards as always were rewarding in all the right ways with me more or less in accord with the majority of the winners. I’m not as far behind on the majority of the winners as last time but I will probably be looking at The Perfect Couple in the days to come and Shrinking I’ll get to soon. The final part of Phase One will probably be the SAG awards though I will include the other major Guilds – Directing, Producing and Writing – in a separate article. I’ll get to all of that next week. Stay tuned.