Jennifer Aniston Skipping Out On Emmys Amid Ongoing Covid Pandemic, Says Appearing On Kimmel “Is Still A Big Step”

Alexandra Del Rosario
·2 min read
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The 73rd annual Emmys will be on Friends cast member short as Jennifer Aniston told Jimmy Kimmel that she will skip out on the annual television awards show.

“I will not be going,” she told the Jimmy Kimmel Live! host on Monday. “This is still a big step for me just to be here. It’s just baby steps.”

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The Morning Show actress’s comments come just a week before the Emmys return for an in-person ceremony on the Event Deck at L.A. Live, directly behind the Microsoft Theater, this Sunday. Unlike the virtual 2020 ceremony, the 73rd Emmy Awards will see a limited amount of nominees gather in-person to accept their prizes and celebrate the best in television this year. She appeared to present at last year’s ceremony, which was hosted by Kimmel.

Aniston, who received a nomination for the Friends: The Reunion special said that executive producer and director Ben Winston will most likely accept the Outstanding Variety Special (Pre-Recorded) award on her behalf, if HBO Max special wins. Friends: The Reunion received four nominations, and is up against Netflix’s Dave Chappelle’s 8:46, HBO Max’s A West Wing Special To Benefit When We All Vote, Netflix’s Bo Burnham: Inside, Disney+’s Hamilton and HBO’s David Byrne’s American Utopia for the Outstanding Variety Special (Pre-Recorded) category.

Since the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, Aniston has been vocal about her concerns over Covid safety. In June 2020, she urged her Instagram followers to consider the toll of the ongoing crisis and continue masking up to prevent the spread of the infectious disease (see the post below).

In August she spoke to InStyle about how the Covid pandemic and discourse about vaccinations altered her personal life.

“It’s a real shame. I’ve just lost a few people in my weekly routine who have refused or did not disclose [whether or not they had been vaccinated], and it was unfortunate,” she told the style magazine. “I feel it’s your moral and professional obligation to inform, since we’re not all podded up and being tested every single day.”

Watch the full clip from Jimmy Kimmel Live above.

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