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TV comedy
‘The more complaints we got, the better’ – how Spitting Image redefined satire
Roy Hattersley, Ian Hislop and other writers, actors and puppeteers reveal what made the original show a success and why we need it now more than ever More
The Succession creator, Jesse Armstrong, used his Emmy acceptance speech to attack Boris Johnson and Donald Trump for their “crummy” response to coronavirus, and also the media moguls who do so much to keep them in power.Armstrong’s HBO show, telling the story of a billionaire media tycoon and his dysfunctional, warring family, was one of the big winners at the ceremony on Sunday. It won seven awards, including outstanding drama, which Armstrong accepted from a hotel room in London.He said it was sad not to be able to share the success with colleagues in the US. “Being robbed of the opportunity to spend time with our peers, maybe I’d like to do a couple of un-thankyous,” he said.“Un-thankyou to the virus, for keeping us all apart this year. Un-thankyou to President Trump for his crummy and uncoordinated response. Un-thankyou to Boris Johnson and his government for doing the same in my country.“Un-thankyou to all the nationalist and quasi-nationalist governments in the world who are exactly the opposite of what we need right now. And un-thankyou to the media moguls who do so much to keep them in power. So un-thankyou!”Armstrong is one of Britain’s most celebrated comedy writers, having co-created Peep Show and Fresh Meat in the UK as well as having been on the writing team for The Thick of It.Succession’s seven wins came from 18 nominations and included the best actor award for Jeremy Strong, who plays the eldest son, Kendall Roy. His success meant that Brian Cox, who plays the patriarch and was nominated in the same category, missed out on a prize that bookmakers had made him odds-on to win.Cox was one of many British and Irish actors to miss out. Olivia Colman (The Crown) and Jodie Comer (Killing Eve) were thwarted in their category when Zendaya made history by becoming the youngest person to win in the best actress drama lead category for Euphoria.Also missing out were Helena Bonham Carter (The Crown), Fiona Shaw (Killing Eve), Matthew Macfadyen (Succession), Harriet Walter (Succession), Jeremy Irons (Watchmen), Paul Mescal (Normal People), Andrew Scott (Black Mirror), Dev Patel (Modern Love) and Phoebe Waller-Bridge for her guest appearance on Saturday Night Live.Aside from Succession the big winners were HBO’s Watchmen, shown in the UK on Sky Atlantic, and the Canadian sitcom Schitt’s Creek, which, since it went on Netflix, has steadily and quietly become a huge feelgood hit. The sixth and final season of the show swept the board in the comedy categories, a feat not even achieved by shows such as Frasier and Modern Family.It won seven Emmys with acting wins for the show’s stars Eugene Levy, Dan Levy, Catherine O’Hara and Annie Murphy. Appearing in the ceremony’s virtual backstage area Dan Levy, its co-creator and showrunner, discussed the possibility of Schitt’s Creek returning as a movie.“Here’s the thing – some people have been asking that,” he said. “If there is an idea that pops into my head and worthy of these wonderful people, it has to be really freaking good at this point.”Other winners included Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, the Birmingham-born writer and comedian who started out on the UK standup circuit before achieving success in the US.RuPaul’s Drag Race, which has spawned a Bafta-nominated British version on the BBC, won the reality competition award.The virtual awards ceremony, hosted by Jimmy Kimmel – “welcome to the Pandemmys” – will go down as one of the oddest in the Emmys’ 72-year history with prizes delivered to winners, often in their homes, by people in hazmat tuxedos.The dress code was “come as you are”, with the suggested option of designer pyjamas. Hardly any of the stars went down that route, although Jane Lynch, in a very smart top, revealed she was also wearing sweatpants.A number of actors used the event to express support for the Black Lives Matter movement, including Regina King, who won the limited series lead actress award for Watchmen. She wore a T-shirt that honoured the police shooting victim Breonna Taylor and used her speech to remind people of the importance of voting.Later she explained why wearing the T-shirt was important. “The cops still haven’t been held accountable,” she said.“She represents just decades, hundreds of years of violence against Black bodies. Wearing Breonna’s likeness and representing her and her family and the stories that we were exploring, presenting and holding a mirror up to on Watchmen, it felt appropriate to represent with Breonna Taylor.” More
Cynthia Nixon Zooms on to my screen from some decking in Long Island. The blue-grey sky is dramatically ominous, a sea breeze blows her hair into photogenic chaos and she is, of course, pretty damn famous – especially to those of us of the Sex and the City generation. So the overall effect is of watching a film, but one that is talking straight to you. Yet, within what feels like barely five seconds, we are discussing the end of democracy, with only the briefest detour to cover the impact wrought on her New York home by coronavirus.“When you’re in New York City, what it reminds me of is the time right after September 11th. It was, in a way, less terrifying than it looked to people watching from the outside, just as it’s strangely less scary to have cancer than to watch someone you love have cancer.”She packs a lot into a sentence – history, terrorism, love, cancer – and is clearly political to her bones: not at all interested in things that simply happen (pandemics and their attendant disruptions) but instead in systems, choices and worldviews. “In terms of the overall political scene across the country, it’s just terrifying. People keep writing these articles about the end of democracy, and it does feel like a real possibility when you have a president who’s trying to sink the Post Office.”At 54, Nixon is a relatively recent discovery as a prominent advocate of the Democratic party’s furthest left: she stood against Andrew Cuomo in the 2018 election for the governor of New York, a race in which she now considers she was doomed from the start. “I was triply burdened,” she says. “I was a woman. I was a gay woman. I was a person who had been an activist for a long time, but had never held political office, and obviously the governor is a really big place to start. And I am an actress, which is a barely coded word for ‘bimbo’ or ‘ditz’. I don’t, in my personal life, ever call myself an actress – I call myself an actor. But Cuomo tried to use that word as often as he could, in a very derogatory way.” More
John Oliver
British-born comic abused city in recent segment on juries
Mayor says plant is ‘full of crap just like you, John’ More
The Simpsons
Character said she’s ‘starting to feel a little disrespected’ in clip after Jenna Ellis said Kamala Harris ‘sounds like Marge Simpson’ More
Documentary
A new documentary finds bipartisan common ground as it follows Republican lawmakers to examine the corrosive influence of money in US democracy More
Shirley Chisholm was a woman of many firsts. She was the first black woman elected to Congress, the first black candidate to seek the presidency, and the first woman, full-stop, to participate in a US presidential debate. She introduced more than 50 pieces of legislation, most championing racial, economic and gender equality, and is often credited as paving the way for Barack Obama. In doing so, she occupied a space that many black women recognise: the solitary seat as the only such face at the table.Uzo Aduba, who plays Chisholm in the acclaimed new FX series Mrs America, says that this was a key factor in bringing this formidable politician to life. “That feeling of being the ‘only’,” she says, speaking via Zoom with a warm smile on her face. “It was important to get that right.”It’s certainly something Aduba can relate to. The 39-year-old made history in 2015 as the first female actor to win both a drama and comedy Emmy for the same role – the part of Suzanne “Crazy Eyes” Warren in Orange Is the New Black. “It was an honour to represent Chisholm,” she says, “because she’s not often portrayed. I just wanted to get her humanity.”The humanity of the much-mythologised feminists of the 1970s is a central part of the series, which spotlights the aims and the internal struggles of the activists who fought to pass the Equal Rights Amendment – as well as the conservatives who opposed it, led by staunch anti-feminist Phyllis Schlafly. A lauded ensemble cast boasts Hollywood giants and household names: Cate Blanchett as Schlafly, Rose Byrne as Gloria Steinem and Tracey Ullman as Betty Friedan, author of The Feminine Mystique. More
‘As guarded as Fort Knox’: the inside story of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign Thousands of hours of behind-the-scenes footage were shot of the former first lady’s disastrous bid for the White House. How did film-maker Nanette Burstein turn it all into a story of hope? ‘As guarded as Fort Knox’ … the candidate in Nanette […] More
