'The Handmaid's Tale' Wins Top Prize at Emmy Awards
Comic Stephen Colbert mocks Trump during opening monologue; Alec Baldwin wins for Trump parodies
The critically acclaimed "The Handmaid's Tale" won the prize for best drama television series at the 69th annual Emmy awards Sunday night in Hollywood. Its star, Elizabeth Moss, who portrayed one of the few fertile women left in a world ruled by a totalitarian regime, won the award for best lead actress in a drama series. The best dramatic actor award went to Sterling K. Brown, one of the stars of the hit series "This is Us." Brown thanked his television family, saying they were the best white adopted family a black actor could have. Last year, Brown won an Emmy for his portrayal of O.J. Simpson prosecutor Christopher Darden in the FX series "The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story." The best comedy series nod went to "Veep," a show about a fictional U.S. politician. It was the third win in a row for the HBO series. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, "Veep"'s star, won the best comedy actress Emmy, her sixth consecutive win. Nicole Kidman won the best actress in a limited series Emmy for her role as an abused wife in HBO's "Big Little Lies." Upon accepting her trophy, she said the series had shined a light on domestic violence, "a complicated insidious disease." The best supporting actress for comedy award was given to Kate McKinnon, from "Saturday Night Live." It was her second win for her role in the late-night weekly comedy institution. The 42-year-old series also won for best variety show. Comic Stephen Colbert was this year's Emmys host. He peppered his opening monologue with numerous jokes about President Donald Trump, and recalled the president's angry comment in the past that he had never won for hosting his former TV series, "Celebrity Apprentice." Colbert teased the Emmy audience, telling them Trump never would have run for the White House if he had scored the top award in U.S. television. And in a reference to the vote turnout last November, when Trump won the presidency despite getting nearly 3 million fewer votes than Hillary Clinton, Colbert said that, unlike the presidential race, Emmys go to the winners of the popular vote. The president's former spokesman, Sean Spicer, made a surprise appearance, rolling out on to the stage on a motorized version of the White House podium. Spicer pronounced this year's show the most-watched Emmy telecast in history, lampooning his own discredited assertion of a record audience for Trump's inauguration in Washington eight months ago. Familiar names and a surprise familiar face were some of the highlights of the awards show. Veteran actress Cecily Tyson, a star of the landmark mini-series "Roots," resplendent in a red gown, had trouble reading the introduction to the limited series award, but like the trooper she is, she finally pulled it off to present the Emmy to "Big Little Lies." Veteran actor John Lithgow won his sixth Emmy Sunday, this time as best supporting actor for playing Winston Churchill in the Netflix series the "The Crown." Another veteran performer, Laura Dern, won her first Emmy as best supporting actress in a TV movie or limited series for "Big Little Lies."