Give Lisa Kudrow and The Comeback an Emmy!

In the bittersweet series finale of The Comeback, Valerie Cherish breaks her Emmy, the same one the once-famous sitcom star spent years desperately chasing before finally winning in the satirical comedy’s touching season two finale. The accident happens during a moment of celebration: after How’s That?—the new AI-written, in-show sitcom Val stars in—gets renewed for a second season, her coworkers rejoice by excitedly pounding on the table. As the banging intensifies, however, the trophy bounces off the table and promptly splits in two. “I’m such an asshole,” exclaims one of her castmates. “Oh my god, Val, I’m so sorry I broke your Emmy! I wish I was dead.”Rather than lashing out, though, Val gets sentimental as she assures her costar that it’s no big deal. The trophy itself is just a talisman, she explains. Lisa Kudrow, who stars as Val and co-created The Comeback alongside Michael Patrick King, plays the moment beautifully, shifting from character’s typically frenzied energy into a decidedly more emotional register. But just as quickly, she slides back into pure comedy when it’s noted that the trophy can be salvaged. “Okay, it’s getting fixed!” Val squeals with delight and a hint of relief. “But, you know, I was ready to let it go, and that’s what’s important.”For over two decades, Valerie Cherish has been one of television’s most beloved fixtures and enduring icons. Despite The Comeback’s erratic release schedule (nine years passed between the show’s first two seasons; another twelve passed before we got the third), Val has never left the cultural zeitgeist. She frequently pops up on social media feeds. “I don’t wanna see that” has become a rallying cry for anyone fluent in memespeak. And Valerie herself has emerged as a symbol for a certain species of middle-aged actress who refuses to be discarded by an industry hellbent on placing expiration dates on anyone without a Y-chromosome, whether she was braving the frontier of reality television in 2005 or undergoing a series of humiliation rituals to carve out a space for herself in the world of gritty, prestige-style dramedies a decade later. Even in the show’s most recent season, as she sacrificed her morals to justify starring in television’s first AI-written sitcom, she did so with as much respect for the flesh-and-blood humans working around her as possible. She’s a true visionary, and that is exactly why the Television Academy should replace Valerie Cherish’s broken Emmy with a real one on Monday night by giving Lisa Kudrow the win for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series.The betting favorite in the race is Jean Smart, who plays a washed-up stand-up comedian experiencing a resurgence in the beloved Hacks. Smart, a Hollywood luminary representing a critically adored comedy, has won for four consecutive seasons of the HBO Max comedy. And given the industry goodwill that seems to have encircled the show in its fifth and final season, there’s no reason to think she won’t complete the cycle.But what if she didn’t? While Smart has deservedly dominated this category for the better part of the 2020s, she seems to finally have a true competitor in Kudrow. And while the lack of overall nominations for The Comeback suggests support for the show itself is more muted, it’s also true that the people who do like The Comeback really love The Comeback.And who could blame them? Though Smart is an undeniable force in Hacks, Kudrow is giving her category’s most dynamic, purely comedic performance. Her Valerie Cherish is weird and quirky, defined by an offbeat sense of humor and an endearingly earnest optimism. The Comeback’s perfectly calibrated blend of campy slapstick and emotional realism gives the actress space to be both extreme and subtle, depending on the scene. This stands in stark contrast to current nominees like The Bear’s Ayo Edebiri and Margo’s Got Money Troubles’ Elle Fanning, who, while brilliant, are situated pretty firmly in the realm of lightly comedic drama. And though Abbott Elementary’s Quinta Brunson is giving a capital-C comedy performance, it’s hard to argue that she’s done anything significantly different from what she was already rewarded for when she won in this category in 2023.This process of elimination is exactly what could lead to a Kudrow upset. Like Smart, Kudrow is also nominated for her show’s final season. But unlike Smart, it’s for a role she has yet to be awarded for. After earning nominations for each of The Comeback’s three seasons (each one in a different decade), it feels unjust that the actress has nothing to show for it. This, despite the fact that she co-created the series in her own image. This, despite the fact that her performance was more deserving than eventual winner Julia Louis-Dreyfus (who beat her with The New Adventures of Old Christine in the first round and with Veep in the second). Wouldn’t it be nice to finally send Kudrow off into the good night with a trophy of her own? Just imagine her accepting the award in character as Valerie Cherish, triumphantly holding the trophy in her hand as she returns to Val’s instantly iconic catchphrase: “Well, I got it!”After all, there is precedent. In 2019, when Julia Louis-Dreyfus was widely predicted to take home her seventh consecutive Emmy for playing Selina Meyer in Veep’s final season, the Television Academy threw a curveball by awarding first-time acting nominee Phoebe Waller-Bridge, who won for the second and final season of her surprise Amazon hit Fleabag. Sure, a series-completing win for Louis-Dreyfus would have felt both welcomed and warranted, but with six trophies already weighing down her mantle, the revered actress couldn’t have been that upset about one loss. On the other hand, the shock and surprise that accompanied Waller-Bridge’s final-hour underdog victory added a real sense of anything-can-happen excitement to the proceedings (and, perhaps more importantly, blessed us with this picture that I think about constantly). It was the best-case scenario.Awards shows can be painfully predictable, and I don’t think I’m alone in believing we could all benefit from a similar jolt of the unexpected at tonight’s ceremony. In a year where Hacks is bound to win somewhere—though maybe not in Outstanding Comedy Series, where the shiny new toy Widow’s Bay is poised to stake its claim—there’s never been a better time to spread the love and crown someone new. And what better candidate than someone representing something old that, despite its cult status, has never been given the recognition it’s so clearly deserved? But don’t take my word for it. To quote Valerie Cherish herself, “When it comes to other people’s opinions, don’t listen to Emmy of them!”