my first official post. And if Bonnie Somerville got Hugh to say "F**k the Emmys!" again. Maybe both Hugh and James G. Oh, dear, and at the top of the top, too.

I got this in a Google alert. A take on why they think Spader won over Hugh. http://www.allyngibson.net/?p=1338

Courtesy of the folks at house_cameron, some BFTV shots of HL & JS (scroll down after the JMo photos, which are very nice too!) http://community.livejournal.com/house_cameron/2441614.html

I got this in a Google alert. A take on why they think Spader won over Hugh. http://www.allyngibson.net/?p=1338 Good grief, I'm tired of blogs showing up in google alerts. I don't even have mine set to include blogs, but I keep getting some chick's livejournal on a weekly basis because she mentions Hugh in almost every single entry. Either way, that's just a chick with a blog. I can't really muster up the energy to care what she thinks.

You're right, GG. There's a big conspiracy 'round here to try and push you off a cliff or something. ...Maybe I shouldn't have said anything :shifty: HL/HM? LOL, that's almost as pretty as Wilson/Chase (the height of pretty in my brain).

A caveat: I'm obviously very biased in Hugh's favor and I'm upset on his behalf (well, as upset as I can possibly be over celebrity slightings) so take what I say with a huge grain of salt. But I wonder if Hugh isn't actually a victim of his own success. I've seen "Boston Legal" and it is, indeed, a very solid show. It has a good ensemble and very whippy storylines. I also know James Spader to be a very capable actor with a long and suitably varied career in support of that. However, when I compare apples to apples and break down the actual performances, Hugh's is not only emotionally, but technically the more difficult performance to pull off. Not only does he have the obvious accent translation to tackle, but the challenging medical-jargon based dialogue and the physicality of mastering the limp and it's omnipresent cane accompaniment. Getting all that to come together seamlessly is a technical feat in and of itself. And that's before the actual acting comes into play. And House is a very emotionally difficult character to make resonant with the viewers effectively. That Hugh manages to hit that tricky mark again and again and again to the degree of success that entire new shows are launched to compete with him (but fail) is a testament to how challenging his job really is and how damned good he is at it. I'll throw it out there that I haven't seen the particular episode of BL that Spader submitted---I'll try to catch it on the re-runs---but nothing I've seen on that show even comes close to the acting tour-de-force that Hugh pulls off weekly, seamlessly, and virtually without flaw. Without flaw to the point that sometimes I wonder if voters forget that he's actually not a grumpy, pill-addicted, brilliant misanthrope with a physical handicap and a natural American accent. Because in the last few years of Emmy awards, the voters are trying to make me believe that Hugh actually has an acting peer in his category. While there are plenty of strong performances to be considered, I do think Hugh is head and shoulders above the pack. But I did say I was biased, didn't I?

I had the "victim of his own success" idea too, but for a different reason: Critical snobbery. House is the most popular scripted show on television now. There seems to be a critical knee-jerk reaction that says that anything that popular can't possibly be that good (and I understand this, because the number one show overall is American Idol, and let's not get me started on that). Question. I keep hearing everyone say that someone -- Hugh himself or his managers or the show's producers or whoever -- picked the wrong episode to submit for Hugh's Emmy consideration. But I have no idea which episode they submitted. Where does one get this information?

Bailey - instead of quoting your whole post, just have to say beautifully and brilliantly said. The only thing I would add is that in addition to all of Hugh's other challenges, he also has the vast majority of the dialogue in every episode as well. And even though I've never seen BL, it's an ensemble show. I guess it is Hugh's fault he doesn't have an Emmy yet....he makes it look too dam easy.

Just interjecting for a moment to point out this little piece of information that is really of very little importance, but I watned to mention it anyway. The new lineup for Leno is: Fr 9/21: Hugh Laurie, Sherri Shepherd, the Editors Now back to the real conversation. {g} And even though I've never seen BL, it's an ensemble show. Minor quibble: even though I agree that Hugh's job is harder than Spaders for several different reasons, I think it should be pointed out that Spader and Shatner are the center of the show. Even though neither of them carries as much screentime or dialogue as Hugh does, they're both the central characters. Maybe it looks like an ensemble show, but it's their show and the other characters, great as they are, are the ensemble that surround them.

Gotcha amy. blackmare - Half-Wit was the episode Hugh submitted. That info comes from goldderby.com.