Jimmy Kimmel Is The 2020 Emmy Awards Host, But He Has No Idea How The Ceremony Will Happen
By Ben Pearson/June 16, 2020 2:45 pm EST
While the next Oscars ceremony was just delayed by two months, this year’s Emmy Awards is currently scheduled to air on ABC on Sunday, September 20, 2020. But there are still plenty of questions about exactly how the ceremony is going to take place in the COVID-19 era, and neither Kimmel nor ABC have any answers yet. I find it hard to believe that the most famous names in television are going to gather in one room for something as comparatively frivolous as an awards show when their lives are literally on the line, but who knows – maybe things will be in a better place by then.
If not, could the entire show happen virtually? Pretend, if you will, that you’re on the edge of your seat watching this year’s show. Your eyes are glued to the TV, your ears are wide open waiting for the presenter to utter just the first syllable of the name you desperately hope wins it all. But when they open the card and say, “the winner is…”, their video stream drops out. The Oscars had its unforgettable “Envelopegate” moment a few years ago, and now the Emmys could be poised for its own disastrous scenario.
Last year’s Emmys were the least-watched Emmys broadcast in history, pulling in only 6.9 million viewers. That ceremony did not have a host, so it’s clear ABC is attempting to boost viewership back up this time. (The question of whether or not Kimmel is an exciting enough choice to draw big audience numbers evidently wasn’t as important as providing a stable, familiar presence at the helm.) This will be his third time hosting, after doing it in 2012 and 2016. According to Forbes, this will be the ninth consecutive year of male hosts for the ceremony. I’ll leave you with a few stats they rounded up about the previous hosts of the show, which I think speak for themselves:
There have only been three female solo hosts in the award show’s 72-year history: Angela Lansbury in 1993, Ellen DeGeneres in 2005 and 2001, and Jane Lynch in 2011.
Michael Che, who hosted in 2018, was the first Black host since Bryant Gumbel in 1997.
