Nate Bargatze hosts Emmys, puts up own money to try to shorten speeches

Nate Bargatze, the host of this year’s Emmy Awards, kicked off the ceremony Sunday with a string of jokes poking fun at the television industry.

The show opened with a sketch where “Saturday Night Live” stars Mikey Day, Bowen Yang and James Austin Johnson joined Bargatze, who played television inventor Philo T. Farnsworth. The audience was warm to Bargatze’s jokes as he, while playing Farnsworth, opined on what the future of TV will be like.

“We create a world where the finest artists craft stories of staggering beauty that millions of people will watch on their phones while they’re sitting on the toilet,” Bargatze said.

Bargatze, a 46-year-old stand-up comic from Tennessee known for his friendly style, was not a typical host. The gig left some wondering how Bargatze would approach it.

Bargatze joked that 77th award ceremony is “not a big one, like 75 or 80, but it’s the one that gave me.”

“My parts will be dumb and silly,” Bargatze told “Entertainment Tonight” on the red carpet ahead of the show.

Bargatze, who wrapped up three shows in Denver on Saturday and Friday ahead of the award ceremony, has emerged as one of the most popular stand-up comedians today. He sold more than 1.2 million tickets in 2024, according to Pollstar and has released three Netflix specials, including December’s “Your Friend, Nate Bargatze” and has hosted “Saturday Night Live.”

Bargatze also dreamed up a creative way to ensure winners keep their acceptance speeches under the 45 second limit. The comedian pledged to donate $100,000 to the Boys & Girls Clubs. He said he would deduct $1,000 for every second a winner goes over the allotted time and will add the same amount for every second under.

Seth Rogen’s acceptance speech for the first category announced, lead actor in a comedy series, was under the allotted time, which bumped the donation to $106,000.

“Don’t go crazy though cause like, I am paying for this,” Bargatze said.

By the end of the show’s first hour, the total had plummeted to $74,000. By the time the show was nearly over, with only a couple of awards left, the tally was negative-$60,000.

After “The Pitt” was announced as the night’s drama winner, Bargatze had one last announcement about the donations: CBS was donating $100,000 to the organization and he would give it $250,000.



(AP Photo Chris Pizello)