The MTV Movie & TV Awards were forced to morph into what largely amounted to a clip show on Sunday, as host Drew Barrymore had retired in solidarity with the WGA, and MTV scuttled plans for interviews at the red carpet and an in-person ceremony in order to avoid friction with picketers (and a lack of talent willing to show up).
The show that aired was made up largely of clips of memorable moments from past MTV Movie Awards ceremonies, from Jim Carrey accepting his award as Jim Morrison to Sacha Baron Cohen landing crotch first on Eminem’s face after a “trick gone wrong”. They even played the entire rendition of Katy Perry and Snoop Dogg’s “California Girl” from the 2010 show, just to fill in the time.
As for the awards themselves, the nominees for each category were called, and then the winner accepted in the form of a pre-recorded message. The multitude of Zoom-style images of winners like Joseph Quinn and Jennifer Coolidge recalled television from the early days of the pandemic to chilling effect.
This is not the show MTV had planned.
When news broke that Barrymore dropped out (she said she would host again in 2024), Bruce Gillmer, president of Music, Music Talent, Programming and Events at Paramount Global, and executive producer of the MTV Movie & TV Awards, said in a statement, “As we carefully search for the best way to deliver the fan-first awards show we imagine our team has worked so hard to create, we are moving away from a live event that still allows us to produce a memorable night filled with exclusive sneak peeks, irreverent categories our audience has come to expect, and countless moments that will surprise and delight as we honor the best of film and television over the past year.”
The sneak peeks continued: The show released clips from “The Little Mermaid” and “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts,” and Barrymore did appear in pre-recorded segments that led to popular projects like “Wednesday” and “Barbie.” But this was far from business as usual, and the changed plans could be a preview of things to come if the strike continues later this year.
When the WGA went on strike in November 2007, it wreaked havoc on the awards season schedule. In solidarity with the Screen Actors Guild, a waiver was granted to the SAG Awards to allow writers to write material for that ceremony, and a waiver was extended for the Film Independent Spirit Awards. But the Golden Globes were denied a waiver, and that January 2008 ceremony amounted to Billy Bush and Nancy O’Dell simply reading out the winners one by one in an hour-long results special with clips but no speeches. of acceptance or presenter.
Ceremonies that went on without writers, such as the Globes and the People’s Choice Awards, plummeted in ratings compared to previous years, and though the strike ended 12 days before the 2008 Oscars, that ceremony also suffered from low viewership. (yes, in that day and age 32 million viewers was considered low!).
The Tony Awards will take place on June 11, but it’s unclear if they will do so in an abbreviated or altered form (or if host Ariana DeBose is willing to cross the picket line). The same goes for the BET Awards on June 23 and the Primetime Emmy Awards are scheduled for September 18.
SAG-AFTRA begins its own negotiations with AMPTP on June 7, and SAG-AFTRA joined the DGA, IATSE, Teamsters and more in a WGA solidarity rally on May 3.
Much is left up in the air, and the MTV Movie & TV Awards of all things may have served as a harbinger of things to come.
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