The most memorable moment of last night’s Emmy awards was from an acceptance speech we didn’t hear. Or part of one, anyway. Having won best drama actress, Sally Field launched into a passionate, flustered speech about playing a mother and dedicating her performance to mothers in wartime. “If mothers ruled the world,” she said, “there would be no God–“
Then nothing. The screen cut away for several seconds to a silent shot of the Death Star-like disco ball hanging above the Emmy stage. Viewers watching in other countries (where the scene did not cut away) posted online last night that Field continued, “–damn wars.”
So why did someone at Fox hit the dump button? Was it the “goddamn” or the antiwar sentiment? We can’t read minds, and Rupert Murdoch does own Fox, but it’s a fair guess FCC activism has left some nervous fingers in the producer’s booths at live shows. (Or “live”–shows like the Emmys run on a brief delay, leaving a few seconds to decide whether to axe an utterance.) Fox unleashed the Death Star of Silence on Ray Romano earlier in the night, for a risque joke about former costar Patricia Heaton, and the censors bleeped a quick expletive from winner Katherine Heigl for everyone but lip-readers.
Awards shows, after all, have been a particular decency trouble spot: NBC got in hot water for an F-word from Bono, while the FCC spanked Fox for a blue joke by Nicole Richie on live TV. Still, a court recently overruled the FCC on the Richie case, and Field’s “goddamn” was not, in any case, in the same league, legally or offensively. The FCC bans sexual and excretory expletives–depending on their context–but both the FCC and the courts have said before that “goddamn” is not actionable. And however offensive to some, it’s no more so than plenty of curses the networks regularly allow in the same hour of primetime.
Whether you agree with Field’s message or like political acceptance speeches is beside the point. (I mean, if inanity were the only bar you needed to censor someone, we’d have been staring at that Death Star half the night.) Fox’s overeager bleeping only ended up giving Field’s speech more exposure while making Fox look like Big Brother. And for what? To protect the children? Yeah, the ones who were staying up until 10:45 p.m. to see if The Sopranos won Best Drama.
Granted, Field could have avoided the whole issue simply by not swearing. But coming late in an awards show where Brad Garrett looked at costar Joely Fisher’s decolletage and reminded himself to buy milk (unbleeped), I think it’s clear enough that this was not a G-rated context to begin with. At worst, Fox was censoring her; at best, it was an overreaction to the climate of fear the FCC has created. Either way, it was goddamn ridiculous.