ACTOR AWARDS 2026

This year’s iteration of the former SAG Awards, now named the Actors, was relatively entertaining, but they came with the de rigueur creepy arrivals interviews. They were that way mainly due to the dreadful hosts of both shows that Mr. X and I watched. We always want to vomit from the interviewers. Why can’t producers hire people who know how to ask a real question, and how to not fawn over every guest? It means nothing when you tell every person that they “look gorgeous” and that you’re “obsessed over them!” It’s mind-boggling that these nincompoops are chosen for the gigs.

As proud long-time Screen Actors Guild members, this is the awards show we were actually the most interested in because we vote for the “Actors.” I don’t think that any of our choices won this time, but I didn’t expect them to. I actually correctly predicted just about every single award winner, even though I’ve seen only three television nominees! I know how these things go. Everyone was surprised by Michael B. Jordan’s Best Actor win, (which was wholly undeserved,) but I knew it would happen.

And FYI, I live-tweeted some of my thoughts on those proceedings, @MajorCelebrity, so you can still read them there because I usually don’t repeat my tweets in my articles in this e-zine.

E ARRIVALS

Get those creepy hosts out of here. They’re sooo phony, especially that woman. She called Abbott Elementary’s Chris Perfetti “PerEtti,” with no “f” in the middle! How stupid for a host who should know every celeb’s name. But at least the male host was somewhat amusing, possibly by accident.

Why did they show old videos of people walking in when it turned-out that they were clips from other shows??? Creepy. This was actually the first time I was tweeting on time, and it all tricked me into commenting on some of the guests like it was live. (But people still read them, with no negative comments, so I guess I’m safe on that front.)

Sheryl Lee Ralph is very talented, but she’s also annoying. However, I enjoyed that she tried not to “twirl” when the inane host demanded she do it, because she knew her back fat would show. Not a great look.

We had never heard of actress Yerin Ha, (still don’t know what her claim to fame is,) but we both said that she seems lovely and darling.

The Pitt’s Patrick Ball, (whose name I recognized because I reviewed him in a play last year,) looked like he literally just woke-up and grabbed his girlfriend’s skirt by accident.

Odessa A’zion, the woman who played the maybe-girlfriend in Marty Supreme, looked like a witch. What is wrong with her? Has anyone ever seen her and that creepy girl from America’s Got Talent, The Sacred Riana, together?

The awful female host, Keltie Knight, had no idea who Adam Scott and Britt Lower from Severance were, (neither do I, by the way,) so she asked inane questions, such as, “How long are the hallways on set?” On top of that, when she wanted to get rid of them, but Britt was about to talk more, Keltie literally changed microphone hands so she could push Britt’s miked hand down to prevent her from speaking more, and then summarily dismissed the duo! I’ve honestly never seen such rudeness on a red carpet! (I had to look all of their names up now, including the host’s, because I had no idea who any of them are!!! But if I were hosting these shows, I’d sure as hell research everyone beforehand!)

I was already in love with the acting of Hamnet’s Jacobi Jupe, but his red carpet interview was the absolute best one I’ve ever seen. I mean it. He’s eleven and every word he uttered was perfect. And to cap it all off, when the host ended it by saying, “Have a good time tonight,” that adorable child replied, “You, too.” I’m crying over here.

How is Bradley Cooper’s ex, Irina Shayk, a model??? Even Mr. X said, “What are her boobs doing?” They were hanging down, plus her hair was filthy and disgusting. I wouldn’t leave the house with mine looking like that. And why was she even at an acting awards show?

Good for Janelle James to say that success can buy stress relief. Most of us never thought of it like that. (Perhaps that’s why I’m always stressed!)

Why in hell would nominee Teyana Taylor wear a dress that has nipples painted on the boobs??? Mr. X even noticed it from afar. (The guests to the side of her when she was being interviewed on the other channel were as shocked as we were by the choice, which you can see in my tweet about it.) And we cannot understand a word she ever says.

Every time we see Demi Moore these days, Mr. X and I both say, “Oh my God. Ewww.” Does she not have a mirror in her house? Nor anyone to tell her what she looks like?

I guess that Parker Posey didn’t have time to get dressed. She rolled out of bed with her nightie and robe and just went with it. But it definitely looks like she saw how old she looked on The White Lotus and got a lot of plastic surgery since then. But in this case, good for her.

NETFLIX ARRIVALS

This was another arrivals show with weird hosts. And who were they? We never saw, nor even heard of, either one of them before. The woman is soooo nasal and has the worst voice; she sounds like someone doing an SNL skit.

Even worse than her voice, though, was that she had absolutely nothing interesting to say or ask. And she kept cutting-off what the interviewees were saying! She wasn’t listening to them at all. The woman was absolutely not even attempting to engage in a dialogue with anybody.

I never heard of, nor saw, the Miss Piggy look-alike, Megan Stalter, but she looked disgusting. Why would anyone choose to look like she did at an awards show??? She even brought along a dirty purse, like she was going to Walmart. Ugh. And even worse is that she was walking around with…a cigarette!!! I’m sure it’s because she feels she has to be outrageous to distract from her awful hair and body, but that was many steps beyond. (But her face is pretty and she and her co-worker were amusing on the show, so perhaps there’s hope for her. She just needs a major gym membership for a few years and to shave her head and start her hair all over again.)

Ali Larter is stunning! And did I hear right that she said she’s fifty? She looks much younger, and naturally so. Mr. X and I both said that she must have seen my Ret Turner-designed dress that I wore on my first Tonight Show appearance because hers looked very similar to mine. Great minds… (But I got mine at Cher’s garage sale, so I get extra props for that.)

Kerri Russell and Matthew Rhys seem like such a lovely couple. I don’t think I’ve ever seen either of their work, but I just may look for them now.

 

THE ACTORS AWARDS SHOW

Having the show on Netflix this year was very weird. Until near the end, the telecast could not be paused and you couldn’t go back. And there are commercials that you can’t barrel through! It’s like watching TV in the ’50s. I have a feeling that it was the only channel SAG could get the show on, or the least expensive, or some such business decision like that. I hope they go back to TBS, or whatever it used to be on, next year.

I’m sure I wasn’t alone in getting choked-up when Michael J. Fox did one of those little “I am an actor” anecdotes at the beginning of the show. Everyone loved seeing him there.

Everyone in Hollywood seems to think it’s cute or clever to curse in public. But it’s just classless. I’m from Brooklyn, so I swear like a truck driver in real life. (Or, at least, my origin story is my excuse to do so.) But, in the almost four hundred episodes of Karen’s Restaurant Revue that I did, which was even on cable TV, I never cursed even once! And trust me, I had lots of reasons to over the years! The cursers really need to stop it.

Case in point—Heated Rivalry’s Connor Storie, (who had just hosted SNL the night before!, so good for him,) said something about “a shit ton of pills.” That was totally not necessary. And he looked so pleased with himself for doing so.

How gorgeous is Jacob Elordi??? I’m still wondering how Guillermo del Toro ever thought that this gorgeous man could play Frankenstein’s monster! (He did pull it off, of course, and beautifully.)

Michelle Williams should have definitely mentioned her Dawson’s Creek “boyfriend,” James Van Der Beek, in her acceptance speech! When she started talking about how your co-stars are your family, that’s where I thought she was going. Shame that she didn’t think the same way.

How dumpy has Lisa Kudrow gotten? Sad.

I knew that Catherine O’Hara was going to win. It would have been wrong for her not to. I even almost voted for her, even though I’ve never seen the show she was on.

But Seth Rogen’s acceptance speech on Catherine’s behalf was perfect. It could not have been any better.

With Timothee Chalamet the most normally-dressed of a group, you know that was one odd-looking cast presenting their film, Marty Supreme. Tyler the Creator must have mistakenly thought he was going to a clambake in winter, and, as usual, Gwyneth Paltrow thinks people want to see her bare chest and different-sized sideways breasts, and, as mentioned before, Odessa A’zion looked like a literal witch.

That was the best that Woody Harrelson has ever looked! Still not good, but better. And I totally felt for him when his jokes were not going over with the audience—I lived that experience myself once, when I opened for the Temptations and Four Tops! It’s a horrible feeling of inadequacy. You just want to run off the stage and hide forever.

I’ve always known that Harrison Ford is the dullest person who ever lived. And his speech proved it. It was completely devoid of humor or charm. But he is eighty-three, so I’m giving him a break. But he still needs to know enough to wipe his running nose, though.

Amy Madigan gave the best speech of the night. Her talk about the anatomies of Barbie and Ken was so real.

I guessed that the In Memoriam section was coming by what Sarah Paulson looked like. She looked like the undertaker, or like she was auditioning for Amy Madigan’s role in Weapons 2.

That was a lovely and appropriate musical interlude after In Memoriam. I paid attention to Miles Caton’s guitar-playing this time because he had said earlier that he learned guitar just for his Sinners role, which I had not known. [My image of it is at the top of this page. Photo by Karen Salkin.]

That entire several-segments-long ping-pong tournament bit was soooo stupid and time-wasting! I’ve adored young actor Jacobi Jupe since I saw him in Hamnet, but the writers of that insanity missed the mark—the winner of this fake tourney should have naturally been Timothee Chalamet! What were they thinking?!

Even as the major mani lover that you know I am, I was impressed by Jessie Buckley’s and Emily Watson’s unadorned fingernails, which told us that they don’t give a fig about such things at all.

Michael B. Jordan gave a very nice and appreciative speech when he won Best Actor. Although I feel he deserved it least of all five nominees, it was nice to see him be so moved, and the entire assemblage so happy for him.

And then my favorite moment of the night came when his film, Sinners, won for Best Ensemble. Not because of its victory, (because it’s an awful movie,) but because I got to witness the chivalry of its young star, Miles Caton, who helped not one of his female co-stars up the steps to the stage, but two of them at the same time! Lovely young man.

So many winners that night were shaking. I guess that means they’re just like everybody else, which is a good thing.

And to end on as non-classy a note as the show did, I was wondering how Special Packages Producer Patrick J. Doody made it through high school, if you get my drift.

Thanks for coming! I’ll be here all week.