Reality show producer gives account of Emmy win

September 17, 2008 by Kelly Anderson

Bryan Scott, co-owner of Picture This Television, details his experience of winning Outstanding Reality Program a second year in a row for Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List and the expectations on Griffin to follow up her controversial acceptance speech from her first Emmy, which featured the line: ‘Suck it, Jesus.’

‘There were a couple of really good [shows nominated] – Intervention is a really strong show and I’m a huge fan of Dirty Jobs – and I thought ‘We’re not greedy, we won last year.’ So I was genuinely really surprised to win and it was just fantastic. And as surprised as I was, Kathy was even more surprised and that was almost worth [winning]. I love it when Kathy is completely thrown off her game because she is someone who is so in control and thinking five steps ahead of everybody so when Kathy is truly floored and surprised, that’s one of the things that I enjoy. That’s one of my own personal ‘see you are human!’ moments.

I think everyone was expecting that [speech] this year and she was basically saying, ‘alright fuckers, here we go again, I’m not going to say suck it to anybody, I love this Emmy and I’m truly excited.’ I know that backstage she was giving press interviews and she was saying ‘I’m on the primetime Emmys next week, I’m presenting with Don Rickles and I didn’t want to say anything that would get me fired from that job.’ I’m hoping that the Emmy voters voted for the quality of the show and that was the reason and not because they wanted to see what Kathy would do this year.

We celebrated by going to the big governor’s ball afterwards and having some sort of mystery meat and walking around smiling really big and getting on a plane first thing in the morning so I can be here at work on Monday. The whole evening is a celebration. Going there, walking down the red carpet, the Governor’s Ball right afterward, you really can’t top that.

Is there pressure on me for another season? No, I’m standing by and ready. I think it’s going to put pressure on Bravo for another season. I’m like ‘Come on make up your minds because we’re standing by ready to go.’ The brilliant thing about Kathy is that its really truly her life so I’m never concerned that there won’t be anything to shoot or there won’t be enough material. She could do anything [for material] and thank god she does. Her level of what she won’t do and shame is very low, which is fantastic because it makes for great comedy.

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