The Emmys: So much right, so little wrong

OK, who are you and what have you done with the Emmy Awards? Last night was such a good show, from the opening Glee number to the hosting by Jimmy Fallon to almost all of the awards that were handed out that at the end of the broadcast (which was on time, btw) I half expected to find Bobby Ewing in my shower. All a dream! All a dream that Kyra Sedgwick finally won! All a dream that Modern Family rocked the house! All a dream that Jim Parsons now has a statuette! Edie Falco, big part of the dream!!!

But no. It was not a dream. It was all real, and thank you, academy, thank you for finally busting out of whatever hideous rut you were in and making some excellent choices.

Let's start from the beginning. When it became immediately clear that they were going with a Glee opening, I groaned. Actually out loud groaned. How obvious, I thought. But you know what? It was FABULOUS. The choice of Born to Run; the stars who participated (Tina Fey, Kate Gosselin with an actual sense of humor, Jon Hamm, Betty White, Jane Lynch, Hurley, I think the chick from Dollhouse, the dude from Community). When Tim Gunn came out I laughed out loud and when Randy Jackson appeared playing bass, I roared. Bravo.

They split the show up into its genre categories. By 8:47, we had blasted through comedy, giving awards to Eric Stonestreet (Cam in Modern Family), Jane Lynch for Glee, Jim Parsons for Big Bang Theory and Edie Falco for Nurse Jackie. All of those were so richly deserved (and what tough competition).

In the reality genre, Top Chef finally knocked Amazing Race off its Emmy throne. That was fine with me too. The year-in-reality montage was great.

In drama, Aaron Paul finally got an Emmy for his amazing portrayal of Jesse on Breaking Bad. I really can't argue with that, although Terry O'Quinn certainly deserved it as well for a mind-blowing final season as John Locke on Lost. And Archie Panjabi got the Emmy for her great role on The Good Wife as the hot and mysterious investigator. Bad speech though. "Great for my career"? Ouch.

Bryan Cranston snagged his third straight for Breaking Bad. You know I wanted Kyle Chandler or Michael C. Hall in this category, and maybe it's time for Cranston to pull a Bill Cosby and take himself out of the running to give the other guys a chance.

Kyra Sedgwick finally got the recognitition her Brenda Leigh Johnson deserves! Yay!

Then Jimmy sang farewell to 24, Law & Order and Lost. I had no idea Jimmy Fallon liked to sing so much.

Ahhh. And then Ricky Gervais arrived, like he always does, with that little smile, knowing that he is going to slay me. He is upset there is no liquor at the Emmys, and notes that there is no one in the crowd who will get drunk and cause trouble. Like, Russell Crowe. Or Mel Gibson. Oh, he says, I'm not going after Mel. He's been through a lot. (Pause). "Not as much as the Jews, to be fair." Genius.

Then he presents the Emmy for variety show directing, and he hopes the winner is someone named Bucky Gunts, who directed the Vancouver Olympics opening ceremony. "I hope it's Bucky Gunts, because I did not know that you could say that on TV," he notes. "We're all Bucky Gunts." And then the winner is ... Bucky Gunts, and Ricky is so happy.

And really, Hollywood? You had to show your liberal media bias and give the best variety show Emmy to Jon Stewart again? You could not throw Conan one little bone?

George Clooney, who was earlier very funny in a Modern Family skit, received the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award. He makes a good point about not forgetting the need once the cameras are gone. Happy 5th anniversary, New Orleans.

We get to mini-series and movies, and I've only seen two of these, including the Temple Grandin movie on HBO, and so I'm glad it won all that it did because it was really good. Claire Danes looks like she is 50 years old.

Al Pacino wins for playing Jack Kevorkian, and Jack Kevorkian was in the audience. I thought he was dead.

The Pacific, which I also saw, won best mini-series. Well-deserved.

Then Tom Selleck announced that Mad Men won best drama, and honestly, that almost wrecked all the good feelings I had built up over the last three hours, and then Ted Danson, looking like the Ghost of Christmas Present, announced that Modern Family had won best comedy, and I was almost all right.

What did you think?