The Morning Show presenter Larry Emdur has reflected on once being “television’s most axed man” after winning the Gold Logie at the Logie awards on Sunday night.
“I’ve never done anything else, and I’ve never wanted to do anything else,” said Emdur, after winning his first Logie in a 40-year career in which he has fronted everything from The Price Is Right to Celebrity Dog School.
He promised to uphold a promise to “have all the nominees’ initials tattooed on my arse live tomorrow morning”, having beaten Tony Armstrong, Julia Morris, Robert Irwin, Asher Keddie, Andy Lee and Sonia Kruger for the evening’s top prize.
“So we’ll see you on The Morning Show tomorrow,” he said.
The US streaming giant Netflix and its hit miniseries Boy Swallows Universe also dominated Australian television’s biggest night, with its 15-year-old star, Felix Cameron, fighting back tears after winning the best actor in a drama and most popular new talent categories for his breakout role as Eli Bell.
“The last award that I won before tonight was student of the week in grade five,” Cameron said at the Sydney ceremony. “This is quite a big deal.”
Accepting the best miniseries or telemovie award, Trent Dalton, who drew on his own family and childhood to write the bestselling novel that inspired the show, paid tribute to “all the mums who are a bit like Frankie Bell”.
“They’re out there in the suburbs tonight, and they’re feeling a bit lost in the darkness,” he said. “Please believe me when I tell you that when your children look at you in the darkness, all they see is your light.”
In his second year hosting the awards, the comedian Sam Pang poked fun at Australia’s free-to-air networks in his opening monologue, including the Logies broadcaster, Seven.
“I stand before you safe in the knowledge that, whatever I say, this network will defend me in court,” Pang said, in a reference to the network’s connection to multiple high-profile legal cases.
“And with their impeccable record in defamation cases in recent years I think I’ll be fine,” Pang added. “Full disclosure: I won’t be paid by Channel Seven tonight. Instead they’ll pay my rent.”
Later in the night, the 60 Minutes presenter Tom Steinfort also made reference to the network when accepting the best news coverage or public affairs report for his show’s investigation, Ben Roberts-Smith: The Truth.
“We definitely weren’t expecting this given Ben Roberts-Smith’s employment history,” Steinfort said. The soldier resigned from Seven West Media last year, a day after a judge found he had murdered unarmed civilians while serving in the military in Afghanistan.
Seven claimed a win of its own when its coverage of the Matilda’s barnstorming Fifa Women’s World Cup run became the first standalone women’s sport event to win the Logie for best sports coverage. The network’s flying doctor drama RFDS also won best drama.
Also on the night, The Flying Doctors and Packed to the Rafters star Rebecca Gibney became the fourth woman to be inducted into the Logies Hall of Fame.
“If someone had told 16-year-old me who suffered crippling anxiety and severe body dysmorphia that one day I’d be standing on this stage with this award, she wouldn’t have believed it,” Gibney said.
The ABC’s long-running satire Utopia also claimed three awards, with Rob Sitch and Kitty Flanagan taking best lead actor and actress in a comedy, while the series won the best scripted comedy award.
Close to the end of the nearly five-hour-long broadcast, the Utopia and Thank God You’re Here star Celia Pacquola delivered a memorable moment after apparently reading the wrong category title from the autocue while presenting best drama program, shouting: “Someone at Channel Seven has fucked me!”
Pacquola’s off-the-cuff remark was trumped only by Emdur’s victory speech, in which he joked that his own children hadn’t watched free-to-air television in 15 years and said: “This is lovely recognition; recognition for me is usually someone yelling on the street, ‘Come on down, you wanker!’”
