John Oliver On Whether He’ll Share His Emmy With Conan O’Brien: “No, He Can Take It From My Cold, Dead Hand” – Emmys Backstage

Anthony D'Alessandro
·2 min read
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They say don’t be a sore winner, show good sportsmanship. Not for John Oliver tonight who won two Emmys for Writing for Variety Sketch show and Best Variety Talk Series for Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, the latter one triumphing over Conan O’Brien.

Asked in the press room about O’Brien looking sad tonight over his loss in Variety Talk Series, and whether Oliver would be handing him any Emmys, the HBO late night host joked, “Conan? No, he can take it from my cold, dead hand!” to great laughs in the virtual Emmy media center.

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“I realize I said I appreciated him — not that much!” continued Oliver sarcastically.

Then getting serious about O’Brien, “It’s hard to overstate the influence he’s had on comedy writers. There’s a whole generation of comedy writers who look to Conan to see what their sense of humor on TV for the first time. He’s a monumentally influential figure to a lot of us.”

“But, no sharing, no, no,” emphasized Oliver.

Then asked about the shout-out to Adam Driver on stage and whether he was in the Last Week Tonight show that was submitted to Emmy voters, Oliver answered “I mean, if he wasn’t, most of last year, even if we didn’t mention his name, his presence was felt throughout all our scripts. So, I don’t know if he was, we noticed Adam Driver last year. I don’t know if you noticed us noticing him. We had said we wouldn’t do the joke again — but if he’s mad about it, that’s what we are really looking for,” continued Oliver.

How many jokes did Oliver write from home, working in his underwear, and how does he feel to win an Emmy for it?

“It’s not just writing the show. You don’t see me below the waist for a reason. So, yeah, I’ve been naked from the waist down for the last 18 months. I resent the fact that has to stop now. It’s been very weird. We have not been together, I do not know when we’ll next be together in a large group, hopefully soon. It’s great to see people I haven’t seen since last March.”

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