What did Nate Bargatze say? Big Bang theory cocreator Bill Prady rips into Emmy’s host monologue

Comedian Nate Bargatze’s hosting debut at the 2025 Emmy Awards stirred mixed reactions after he introduced an unusual way to keep acceptance speeches short. During the ceremony, Nate Bargatze announced that he would donate $100,000 to the Boys & Girls Club but explained that the amount would decrease if winners went over their allotted 45 seconds on stage.

“What I came up with is I’m going to donate $100,000 to the Boys & Girls Club. That’s what the show’s starting out with, I know how hard you guys have all worked to get here. I’m not trying to take anything away. Forty-five seconds, that’s what you got. If you want to do more than that, do it on social media later, more people are going to see it there anyway,” he explained.

Nate Bargatze's plan included deducting $1,000 from the donation for each second that speeches ran long.

“Remember how fun that was because this part is hard to say. If you stay at 45 seconds, it stays at $100,000, every second you go over 45 seconds, we will deduct $1,000 away from the Boys & Girls Club. That’s tough. It’s brutal. What are you gonna do, though? You know, I can’t change it. This is a game I made up, and these are the rules,” he shared.

The idea drew criticism online. As per Us Weekly, the Big Bang Theory creator Bill Prady wrote on X,

“The Boys and Girls Club bit on the #Emmys is just awful and uncomfortable and they should bail on it @TheEmmys.”

Nate Bargatze explains Emmy speech donation rule as TV Academy allows political remarks:

According to Variety, TV Academy president Maury McIntyre and chairman Cris Abrego confirmed that winners and presenters at this year’s Emmy Awards would not be restricted from making political remarks or commenting on current events.

“We’re not looking to censor anyone or their acceptance speech, they’re free to say what they want for as long as they want — as long as in this case, they’re willing to pay the Boys and Girls Club,” Abrego explained, referencing host Nate Bargatze’s plan to manage speech lengths.

Accoring to USWeekly, Nate Bargatze explained how he came up with the idea of donating to the Boys & Girls Club, what led to it and the rules that would be followed to ensure Emmy winners were mindful of the length of their speeches.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” Bargatze admitted. “It could cost me a ton of money. It could cost me no money. I just thought of it because everybody brings up, is there a way to kind of keep these speeches down? Nothing really works.”

“First we thought just taking the money away, but that’s not fun, and we don’t want to take away from the Boys & Girls Club. But then to encourage them to give their time, you can put money back into it. Plus, all night we will be talking about the Boys & Girls Club, and they’re just a wonderful organization, ” he added.

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Nate Bargatze, producers promise Emmy night will be ‘Escape’ despite headlines:

As per the report shared by Variety , the Television Academy confirmed that it was reviewing security measures for Sunday’s Emmy Awards following the shooting of Charlie Kirk earlier in the week.

“We’re absolutely relooking at all of our security plans, but we always have a very robust security plan in place,”

TV Academy president and CEO Maury McIntyre told Variety.

“I know that basically once things happened yesterday, our security personnel all gathered together to just recheck things like that. Sitting with the LA Police Department, sitting with our department of transportation, just to make sure that we felt buttoned up. We are confident in the plans we’ve got in place.”

Executive producer Jesse Collins, whose Jesse Collins Entertainment is producing the Emmy broadcast for the third year in a row, also emphasized confidence in the safety arrangements.

“All the years that we’ve been doing this show, we’ve seen security do an amazing job and making sure that everybody is safe. I don’t see any reason for that to change. They’ve always been focused on the show, and everyone down here at the Peacock Theatre is really best in class at that.”

As for the telecast, host Nate Bargatze, Collins and fellow producer Jeannae Rouzan-Clay said no changes were necessary in light of recent events.

“I don’t think we had any jokes that affected it, that we thought we would have to pull out, I think it’s my job to stick to what I do and make this night be an escape from these past 24-48 hours… so we’re just going to kind of keep doing what we do, and send our hearts out to him and his family.” Nate Bargatze explained.

With the spotlight on both safety and speeches, the 2025 Emmy Awards set the stage for a broadcast unlike any other.