Father-son duo Eugene Levy and Dan Levy took the stage to host the Emmy Awards Sunday night in their matching tuxes, black frame glasses and prominent eyebrows. And they began by making sure viewers know that they are not stand-up comedians—seemingly as a way to temper expectations.
“I wouldn’t actually even call us hosts,” Dan Levy said. “More like actors acting like hosts, which is a huge gamble for us. But if it goes well tonight, my name is pronounced Lev-y not Lee-vy.”
“And if things go south, my name is pronounced Martin Short,” Eugene Levy added.
That prediction proved a bit too accurate when the first presenters of the night took the stage, Only Murders in the Building stars Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez, and quickly upstaged the actual hosts with some harder-edged bits that landed a bit better with the celebrity-filled audience of celebrities
“Steve, let me just say what an honor it is for me to be working with someone who looks like he’s fallen and can’t get up,” Short joked.
That was followed by Martin, who added, “And let me say what an honor it is for me to be working with someone who looks like a former women’s tennis champion.”
But Gomez got the best line off when she joked, “And let me say what an honor it is work with two guys who are this far away from being childless cat ladies.”
As for the Schitt’s Creek stars, their best joke came at the expense of the year’s most-nominated “comedy series,” The Bear.
“I know some of you might be expecting us to make a joke about whether The Bear is really a comedy,” Eugene Levy said. “But in the true spirit of The Bear, we will not be making any jokes.”
That line, at least, got a huge laugh from the show’s Emmy-nominated star Ayo Edebiri.
