Quinta Brunson had to step over Jimmy Kimmel to accept her Emmy

CNN
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Quinta Brunson brought the audience to their feet when she won her first Emmy – but at her feet at the moment was Jimmy Kimmel, who pretended to be unconscious and remained on the floor while she accepted her award as part of an intended joke that ended up pissing off some viewers.

Kimmel presented the award for Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series with Will Arnett, who dragged Kimmel on stage and joked that Kimmel “got into the skinny margaritas” at the theater’s bar after losing in an earlier category.

After the “Abbott Elementary” creator and star was announced as the winner for writing the pilot for the hit sitcom, Kimmel was left on the ground at the bottom of the microphone stand. He remained there throughout Brunson’s acceptance speech and into the commercial break, nearly two minutes total.

Recordings shared by a ceremony attendee showed Arnett dragging Kimmel’s body off stage at the end of the segment.

Brunson, unfazed, used her limited time to thank the “Abbott Elementary” team, her family and her husband, but not without taking a dig at Kimmel: “Jimmy, wake up. I won!”

Kimmel remained off camera throughout Brunson’s speech, which lasted about a minute.

Later backstageBrunson addressed the moment, saying it “didn’t bother me that much,” adding that Kimmel was an early supporter of her and “Abbott Elementary.”

“Tomorrow I might be mad at him. I’m going to his show on Wednesday so I can punch him in the face,” she joked.

It would be the last time Brunson appeared on stage Monday. “Ted Lasso” won over “Abbott Elementary” in the outstanding comedy category, its second win in as many years.

Although Brunson’s win was widely celebrated — “Abbott Elementary” is a smash hit, ABC’s most successful comedy in years — many viewers chastised Kimmel for not ceding the spotlight, especially to a black woman accepting her first Emmy. (Kimmel, meanwhile, has been nominated for 18 Emmys and won two since 2012.)

Sociologist Nancy Wang Yuen, who studies race in the entertainment industry, congratulated Brunson on “Abbott Elementary,” whose cast is primarily Black and set in an underfunded elementary school in Philadelphia. But she didn’t think much of Kimmel’s joke: “And host Jimmy Kimmel, stand up, it’s unfunny and rude,” Yuen tweeted.

Ernest Owens, an editor at Philadelphia Magazine, said he was annoyed by Kimmel, who he said tried to take attention away from Brunson’s victory.

Brunson, meanwhile, will return with the anticipated second season of “Abbott Elementary” on Sept. 21.