The Brits Win Big At International Emmys
The Brits were the big winners at the International Emmy Awards last night in New York. Winning more awards than any other country, Britain triumphed in six categories including Best Young People’s programme and Best Drama. The annual awards honour TV programmes produced from outside of the US and were this year held at the Hilton Hotel in New York.
Host Graham Norton did a brilliant job; cracking jokes about Madonna, Donald Rumsfeld and newly married cultists TomKat, all without the malfunctioning autocue. Guest presenters doled out prizes to the winners including the brilliant David Walliams and Matt Lucas for Little Britain, which won Best Comedy. Sexy Beast star Ray Winstone was named best actor for his role in Vincent, while the very sweary Gordon Ramsay picked up the Non-scripted entertainment prize for his show Kitchen Nightmares. Other British winners were Lesbian drama Sugar Rush, Time travelling cop show Life On Mars, and BBC documentary Hiroshima.
Other nations to win top honours at the I-Emmys were Germany, The Netherlands and France. Steven Spielberg was this year’s recipient of the Emmys Founders award for his TV producing career. This is well deserved with the likes of Taken, ER, Band Of Brothers and the recent series Into The West. Spielberg took the only standing ovation of the night as he accepted the award from Katie Couric. Other presenters included Susan Sarandon, Christiane Amanpour and Rosie Perez.
The International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, which has 500 members from 70 countries, decide the awards nominees and winners each year. The Brits have always done well, but future years may see an increase in Non-European winners as the event organisers try and include more non-English speaking nations in the finalists for each category. But for now, we’ll revel in our small glories 
Emmy Awards, British, New York, Little Britain, Steven Spielberg
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