Nate Bargatze speaks onstage at the 77th Primetime Emmy Awards held at the Peacock Theater on September 14, 2025 in Los Angeles, California.
Variety via Getty Images
The 77th Emmy Awards came to CBS on Sunday, September 14. Stand-up comedian Nate Bargatze hosted the star-studded event. Bargatze opened the show with a take on his own Saturday Night Live sketch “Washington’s Dream” with an Emmy’s Twist.
The original sketch ran in October 2023, when Bargatze first hosted of the long-running sketch show. In the sketch, Bargatze plays George Washington and explains the confusing nature of modern-day America. The sketch was popular online, and the comedian revived the premise in 2024 during his second time hosting SNL.
For the Emmys version of the joke, Bargatze played Philo T. Farnsworth, the inventor of TV. He was joined by SNL’s Bowen Yang, Mikey Day and Brian Austin Johnson as Farnsworth’s employees. In the sketch, he explains the state of modern-day TV. In reference to the Emmy-nominated Severance, Bargatze quipped that in the future TV will have “shows that make us laugh and cry, and shows about people who, when they go to work, switch to different people in their brains that only remember what happened at work.” He went on to make jokes about the History Channel only making TV shows about aliens and streaming being “a new way for companies to lose money.”
After the opening sketch, instead of launching into a monologue, Stephen Colbert emerged on stage to announce the award for lead actor in a comedy series to a lengthy standing ovation. Colbert made several jokes about needing a job and even brought a fake resume with a youthful headshot of himself. He then announced Seth Rogen had won for The Studio. After Rogen gave a short and seemingly improvised speech, Bargatze returned for a brief monologue.
He started the monologue with some fairly self-deprecating jokes, saying this year’s Emmy “is not a big one like 75 or 80, but it’s the one they gave me” and “a lot of people are wondering why I am hosting.” The crowd met him with nervous laughter before he introduced a running bit that would continue through the award show.
Bargatze explained that there would be an added incentive not to exceed the 45-second limit on speeches. He told the crowd, “Everybody gets 45 seconds… if you want to do more, do it on social media, more people are going to see it there anyway,” before announcing that he will give $100,000 to the Boys and Girls Club of America. “If you stay at 45 seconds, it stays at $100,000. Every second you go over, we will deduct $1000 from the Boys and Girls Club of America.” He also promised to add $1000 for every second someone stays under. To show he meant business, he added $6,000 for Rogen coming in under 45 seconds. The joke feels evocative of Conan O’Brien, especially his joke during the 2006 Emmy Awards where O’Brien threatened that if the awards went long Bob Newhart would suffocate in a sealed box.
Throughout the night, a ticker with the donation amount was periodically superimposed under speeches and shown on a screen behind Bargatze. He also brought out J.B. Smoove to speak about the Boys and Girls Club. Some winners mentioned the donation clock, including Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series, Hannah Einbinder, who promised to donate whatever she went over before running the clock to say, “Go Birds, f*ck ice and free Palestine.”
The donations bit felt like a gutsy addition and Bargatze seemed nervous at moments. However, it was unclear if his energy was because of the risky and long-running bit or other factors.