Jimmy Kimmel addressed the all-time-low ratings for the 72nd annual Emmys ceremony, which he hosted, at the top of his ABC show on Monday.
“Well, I hosted the virtual Emmys last night. They’re saying it was the highest-rated Emmys ever. Oh, the lowest? Oh, all right,” he joked during his monologue on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in his first episode back from a summer-long vacation (Live! was hosted, in Kimmel’s absence, by several guest hosts including Anthony Anderson and Billy Porter). “Well, we set a record, let’s just say that.”
The 2020 Emmys, which aired on ABC, pulled in 6.1 million viewers and a 1.2 rating for the 18-49 age demographic, per time-adjusted Nielsen numbers. It’s the second consecutive year the show has had record-low ratings: Fox’s 2019 show ultimately drew 7 million viewers and a 1.7 rating for 18-49s.
Still, Kimmel called the show “a lot of fun” and poked fun at some of the winners’ video backgrounds. “For instance, we learned the winner for best actor, Jeremy Strong, has been haunting a Sears portrait studio,” he said, referring to the Succession actor, who won in the drama category. Of Ozark’s Julia Garner, who won for supporting actress in a drama series, he said she “almost forget to thank her husband even though he was six inches away from her in a red silk bathrobe.” Zendaya, who accepted her best actress in a drama series prize for Euphoria with a number of people behind her, prompted Kimmel to comment, “We learned that the only person social-distancing in Zendaya’s house was Zendaya herself.”
Kimmel, who has previously hosted the Emmys as well as the Oscars, said the “weirdest” part about 2020’s half-live, half-virtual ceremony was that “when it was over there are usually parties and everyone is carrying their Emmys around, everybody’s happy, everybody’s celebrating. This year, the show ended and it was like ‘Well, I guess I’ll go into my car and drive home.’ It was nothing.”
The 72nd annual Emmys aired on ABC at 5 p.m. PT on Sunday, Sept. 20 and filmed both from Los Angeles’ Staples Center and remotely.
This article originally appeared in THR.com.
