Hollywood Analysis: Emmys walk the line

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 5 (UPI) -- Even though the realities of the terrorist attacks provided a somber context, the 53rd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards telecast managed to provide some entertaining moments -- as well as evidence that Hollywood is learning to adjust to life after Sept. 11.

Ellen DeGeneres is earning high marks from TV critics around the nation as a good-natured host who struck a proper balance between irreverence and respect for the seriousness of the times.

Several of the acceptance speeches played on a set of common themes -- including gratitude at living in a free country and admiration for the uniformed police, fire, rescue and military personnel who responded to the terrorist attacks.

If there was one image in the three-hour telecast that captured the spirit of the evening, it might have been the shot of comedian Bob Hope on one of his many USO tours, standing on the stage with a statuesque woman in a bathing suit -- reminding the troops that "this is what you're fighting for."

There had been considerable sentiment -- both inside and outside of the entertainment industry -- against staging the awards after they were postponed twice, first because of the terrorist attacks and then because of the air strikes against Afghanistan.

But the telecast that originated from the Shubert Theatre in Los Angeles Sunday night made the point time and again that America is fighting once again for freedom. By implication, the point was also made that freedom worth fighting for must be used and enjoyed in order to give meaning to the struggle.

Following several weeks of tentative steps toward a return to normalcy, Hollywood took a more generous helping of freedom Sunday than it had dared to go for at any other time since Sept. 11. At the same time, the entertainment industry did what it could to reassure its public that it does not take for granted either its freedom of expression or the price of that liberty.

The telecast more than adequately found a comfortable middle ground between the customary mindless euphoria of awards ceremonies and the morbid preoccupation with tragedy that almost certainly would have dominated if organizers had proceeded with the event on Sept. 16, as originally scheduled.

Still, there are critics who remain difficult, if not impossible, to placate.

For example, consider the remarks of critic-at-large Michael Medved, who hosts a syndicated talk radio show and sometimes contributes opinion columns to USA Today.

Last Friday, Medved used his radio show to deride the anxiety in Hollywood over the on-again, off-again travails of the Emmys. Medved low-rated the significance of the awards by suggesting, with a fair amount of sarcasm, that his life would somehow not be complete if he were not able to see DeGeneres, et al., on the telecast.

There is no doubt that Medved spoke for a large number of people who have no use for the Emmys telecast -- or anything Hollywood, for that matter. But it is unwise to single out Hollywood -- or the TV industry, or an individual awards show -- for ridicule as an example of the trivialization of modern life.

Shoot, a lot of people don't like baseball.

To slam any institution is also to slam large numbers of people who enjoy it, subscribe to it or perhaps even believe in it -- people who are harmlessly exercising the very freedoms that are currently the central focus of our national life.

In the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, one of the most frequently asked questions -- not just in the entertainment business, but everywhere -- was: "What do we do now?"

That has been a central question facing humans for millennia. The answer has changed in its details and particulars over time, but useful responses have always had one fundamental element in common -- that whatever problems arise, whatever challenges we face, what we do is, we figure it out and go from there.

That's what America is doing now, and that's what Hollywood took a significant step toward accomplishing at the Emmy Awards on Sunday.

To the extent that anyone in the TV industry still needs to justify the decision to go forward with the awards, the event should have answered most objections voiced by most skeptics about the propriety of what, in the past, has amounted to little more than a glorified exercise in self-congratulation.

Hollywood can justifiably be indicted, on occasion, for a multitude of sins -- including but not limited to vanity, self-absorption and delusional estimations of its own importance. But Hollywood is every bit as much a part of America life as the military, organized religion or the public library system.

Any suggestion that it is unseemly for the entertainment industry to enjoy its freedom brings to mind a classic moment from Alun Owen's Oscar-nominated screenplay for the 1964 Beatles' movie, "A Hard Day's Night."

The lads are riding on a train with a stuffy upper class Englishman -- and giving him lots of cheek -- when the man, exasperated, blurts out: "See here! I fought in the war for the likes of you!"

To which Ringo replies: "I'll bet you're sorry you won."

Artists and business people alike agree that freedom is a gift and that, as such, it should not come with strings attached. The Emmy Awards showed that the TV industry is learning once again to enjoy the gift.