Nate Bargatze, before the number started to plummet, at the 2025 Emmy Awards Kevin Winter/Getty Images Share on Facebook Share on X Share to Flipboard Send an Email Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Print the Article Post a Comment One of the biggest challenges an awards show host faces is helping the producers keep time, and the No. 1 offender is acceptance speeches. Everything else can be planned out and rehearsed, but the winners' thank yous are unpredictable. Live awards shows have traditionally battled the issue with music meant to play off the winner when they got long-winded - a gentle, orchestral nudge. For a while, it worked. When the muzak began to feel more like a suggestion than a mandate, awards shows progressively increased the overture's volume until the winner's audio became barely audible. It added a bit of an embarrassment factor to going long. Related Stories Movies Oscars: Brazil Picks Wagner Moura's 'The Secret Agent' as Best International Feature Submission Movies Poland Picks Agnieszka Holland's 'Kafka' as Best International Feature Oscar Submission At one point, awards shows experimented with cutting the stage microphone off altogether; the threat front-loaded speeches and put the nominees on notice. But the extreme tactic backfired when the most heartfelt or culturally important moments were literally silenced. It was not a good look, and the boo birds in the crowd could be heard (and felt) all the way through the TV screen - whether or not the centerstage mic was on. So, what can one do when the consensus says awards shows are way too long as it is? The production can try to get clever. A decade ago at the 66th Emmys, host Andy Samberg put up a jet ski to the winner who gave the shortest acceptance speech, which turned out to be Jon Hamm, a person who could afford many jet skis. But it was cute, funny and harmless - Andy Samberg comedy to a "T." Last night, as emcee of the 2025 Emmy Awards, another very funny and harmless host, Nate Bargatze, tried something like that. At the top of the show, Bargatze pledged $100,000 to the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, though that was just the start. Emmy winners got 45 seconds to give their acceptance speech, and for every second they didn't use, Bargatze added $1,000 of his own money to the donation. However, and as Bargatze put it, "This part is hard to say," for every tick of the clock over their 45 seconds, $1,000 was deducted from the total. The plan was presented early and perfectly by Bargatze to a tickled audience. It was, of course, always going to fail. When have you ever seen an awards show go short? There was no way the bank would end in the black, but the only real failure here was in the bit's ongoing execution. Many viewers, especially the very online viewers, hated the gag from the get-go. But anyone with a brain should have known that Bargatze was never going to stiff the Boys & Girls Clubs of America. Not only is he a very rich and very successful stand-up comedian, Bargatze is a family man, a charitable guy and just generally considered to be a good dude. He is very open about his Christian faith, and has always worked clean; this charity bit is as dangerous as Nate Bargatze gets. The only real question was, how much would he tack on at the conclusion of Sunday's Emmys to guarantee a happy ending? As it turns out, the donation was $100,000 of CBS' money and $250,000 of Bargatze's. Did you seriously think he was going to invoice the 501(c)(3)? "What an incredible night! Our heartfelt thanks to Nate Bargatze, CBS and the Emmy Awards team for supporting Boys & Girls Clubs in such a big way," Jim Clark, the president and CEO of the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, said in a statement shared with The Hollywood Reporter. "It was a true honor for our Club Kids to share the stage with the night's winners, especially knowing some of our alumni have gone on to become Emmy winners themselves." Bargatze announced the plan in interviews leading up to the weekend, and clearly, Clark was in on this. The Boys & Girls Clubs of America sent what seemed to be (at minimum) dozens of club kids to the Emmys to serve as seat fillers and stage escorts. The Emmys had multiple cutaway segments to comedian and actor JB Smoove, a Boys & Girls Clubs alum, in the crowd with the kids. Club kids served as talent wranglers following each speech, long or short. "We are also deeply grateful to all who kept their speeches short in the spirit of this fun challenge and to maximize the impact for our young people," Clark said. "The generous $350,000 donation from CBS and Nate is a powerful investment in the dreams and great futures of millions of young people nationwide." And that $350,000 doesn't even count how much money Sunday's Emmys raised for the Boys & Girls Clubs via the Hollywood elite (and rich) in attendance, and through viewers. We don't actually know the grand total that