Lorne Michaels Delivers Emotional Chris Farley Tribute As Saturday Night Live Wins Another Emmy – Watch The Speech

UPDATED with video: Saturday Night Lives Emmy win Sunday was hardly unexpected, but the shows usually stoic creator Lorne Michaels delivered a surprisingly emotional acceptance speech, taking the time to make a touching tribute to the late Chris Farley.

Accepting the Emmy for Outstanding Variety Sketch Series – a win that contributed to SNLs massive 72 total wins over the last 44 seasons – Michaels noted that the episode submitted was the Adam Sandler-hosted episode that included Sandlers tribute to his old pal Farley. (Watch Sandlers tribute below.)

“This means a lot,” Michaels said. “The show we submitted was the show Adam Sandler did. He came back to host 24 years after he left, and in middle of the show he did a tribute to Chris Farley, and the crew and the cast and everyone who was in that studio, most of whom worked here when Chris Farley and Adam Sandler were young men, its rare that you see a camera man tear up or the boom crew crying. It was a very chilling moment, and very powerful.”

The troubled Farley died of a drug overdose in 1997. Michaels ended his acceptance by saying that moments like Sandlers Farley tribute are “what keeps us there. And the politics.”

It was a sweet moment, undermined only a bit by the Emmy directors cutting to a wider shot that showed a grinning Kenan Thompson taking cell phone pictures of the audience from the stage as Michaels spoke.

SNL also won the Emmy for Outstanding Directing For A Variety Series, with director Don Roy King, who helmed the submitted Sandler episode, accepting. With the two wins, SNLs total over its long run climbed to 72.

SNL was widely expected to take the big trophy, despite a fairly strong, if not as high profile or widely viewed, line-up of competitors: Showtimes Who Is America?, IFCs Documentary Now!, Hulus I Love Your America, ComeRead More – Source