Five shows in which Emmy host Neil Patrick Harris did a better job

Neil Patrick Harris isn’t new to hosting award shows. He’s become something of a professional host, having hosted the Tony Awards four times, as well as the People’s Choice Awards, and done an opening number for the Oscars in 2010. But this time, reactions to Harris’s turn as the Emmy host were mixed. Rather than begin with a big song-and-dance number (a signature Harris style), he began with pretending to binge-watch the shows being nominated that night, while giving a running commentary to the audience. [caption id=“attachment_1127765” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  A screengrab of Neil Patrick Harris from the 2013 Tony Awards. Image courtesy Youtube.[/caption] The dull start then moved on to Harris being interrupted by former Emmy hosts, who offered everything from tips to hosting, as well as jealousy that they weren’t asked again. Previous Emmys hosts Jane Lynch, Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Fallon showed up onstage. Fallon suggested Harris tap dance. “I’m not going to do anything like that. That is far too gay,” Harris said. Lynch, meanwhile, joked that she wasn’t asked back because she’s a woman. Midway through the ceremony, viewers had the chance to see Harris in action. Surprise! “I’m more than just a song and dance man,” he said before showing off his song and dance skills in a song about performing a “number in the middle of the show.” Opening numbers are just old hat, Harris sang. Old hat they might be, but they do work. Below are five past examples of Harris’s hosting that outshone his turn at the Emmys last night. 1. 2010 opening number at the Oscars Harris was supposed to perform this as a duet with Martin Short, but Short had to pull out at the last moment, making this a solo. Harris described this as “incredibly intense”. “I remember being crouched down behind a silver, gilded staircase as they counted down from 20 to zero until we were live and I was about to open the Oscars. I was probably as quiet and stressed as I’ve ever been,” Harris said to The Daily Beast.

2. Singing “It’s not just for gays anymore” at the Tony Awards in 2011 With this opening number, Harris took some more risque lyrics (“It’s not just for dudes who like dudes anymore!”) and made them family-friendly, all the while poking fun at theatre itself (“Theatre: it’s a two-hour live-action, barely affordable, un-lip-synced version of Glee”). The number also incorporated every musical that was participating that year, especially The Book of Mormon. But maybe the biggest laugh of this number was when Harris introduced himself with: “Good evening, I am teen heartthrob Neil Patrick Harris.”

3. Opening the 2012 Tony Awards as Spiderman - while upside down Harris stayed upside down for a head-spinning two minutes while Angela Lansbury spoke about the relevance of the Tony Awards. He did a bit where he pretended (we presume) that he was stuck on his rig, while the speakers made puns about “no strings attached”, and not “leaving anyone hanging”. Harris paid a price for this bit though: “After the actual show, I was coughing up blood, for real,” he said to The Daily Beast. “I’m not sure why, I think it was because so much blood had rushed to my head and I had committed more than I normally would and was flailing about more than I would. I must have burst something somewhere.”

4. Playing real angry birds at the 2010 Video Game Awards In the opening number of the Video Game Awards, Harris re-enacted all the nominated video games. This included gunning down all the dancers with AK-47s, and trying to shoot live chickens, from a real-life catapult, into painted green pigs in boxes while trying to re-enact Angry Birds.

5. The opening number at the 2013 Tony Awards Harris opened at the awards by pretending to be an up-and-coming singer, and then going on to sing about all the nominated shows in a single song - right before he went “bigger.” The opening song and dance was well, legendary.