Nate Bargatze probably isn’t the Emmys host most people were expecting — which seems to be the reason he’s hosting. The Tennessee-bred comedian doesn’t live in Hollywood. He’s nice, polite and genuinely seems to want the best for people. So basically … we’re not exactly sure how he got the gig. But like the George Washington character he famously portrayed on “Saturday Night Live,” the measure and logic of his popularity is hard to quantify yet it’s oddly reasonable to the average American.
What Bargatze cultivates in comedy is a radical sense of safeness at a time when things feel hopelessly the opposite. When talking to him days before hosting the 77th edition of the awards, it’s clear that he knows his role is to entertain, make people laugh and move the night along. Behind that simple directive, there’s a genius to his slow, Southern gentleman persona that has made him the country’s highest-grossing stand-up comedian. So much so that he’s doing two back-to-back arena shows in Denver before the awards show just as a warmup.
With a reputation for clean comedy and fostering a sense of stability for his fellow stand-ups under his ever-expanding production company, Nateland, Bargatze continues his mild-mannered hot streak. Viewers may tune in to root for just that, even if they care less and less about awards shows.
Bargatze spoke to The Times about his hosting game plan, the importance of using the awards show as a platform to spotlight stand-up comedy and his genius plan to keep the winners’ thank-you speeches on Sunday mercifully short.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
Have you ever watched the Emmys?
Uh, yeah, I’ve watched the Emmys. [Pause] Yes. I want to think if I’ve watched … yeah, I’ve watched them. You know what — I think I watched ’em.
I would probably say that too.
[Laughs] No, I’ve watched the Emmys, and I have gone back and rewatched some. But I remember watching them all [growing up]. When shows like “Breaking Bad” were on, TV really started changing and shows started becoming these huge kinds of shows that everybody was so into.
It’s a question on my mind because your fans don’t seem like the average people who watch the Emmys, so the crossover is kind of interesting with CBS bringing you in as a host.
Yeah, I thought the same thing when they asked me. It’s a delicate thing. I’m impressed by everybody, and I know the hard work it takes to make stuff. Award shows are very exciting. I do like award shows, and I think everybody in the country likes award shows because it’s fun to see if your favorite things are gonna win or not — I look forward to it. Award shows are live, these are fun things. It can compete with sports in a way. And so, doing it in a great, fun way, should be something everybody looks forward to.
You’ve done stand-up in pretty much every arena, and now you’re literally performing in arenas, but what is different about writing jokes for an awards show?
You know, it’s finding a balance. Honestly, I haven’t seen all the shows yet, so I’m not going to know everything about every show, and I trust the writers on the [awards show]. But then I don’t want to be disrespectful to the shows because I’m being ignorant for maybe not knowing these shows. It’s not like I’m better than the shows. People don’t see everything. Not everybody has seen my stand-up. I want to be polite to everybody in the audience, but we could also joke because not everybody [at the Emmys] has seen every show.
You were nominated for a couple Creative Arts Emmys this time around and lost both … do you think they messed up?
They messed up, man. I thought it was guaranteed since I was hosting.
I thought for sure they’d throw you a bone, right?
As most people will say … it’s nice to be nominated.
But I think it brings up an interesting question because the categories you were nominated in were under outstanding variety special. Do you think at this point, given how comedy has become so dominant, stand-up specials should have their own category?
I do. I absolutely do. Stand-up comedy is a newish art form. It’s getting way more into the mainstream and I think you need to have it [grouped] together [in its own category]. For [outstanding writing for a variety special] I’m up against “SNL 50,” and that’s a whole team of writers.
And then for [outstanding variety special (pre-recorded)] we’re against, like, [Conan O’Brien’s Mark Twain Prize ceremony] or some big production. It’s just such a different kind of thing, so I think stand-up should [have its own category]. I think people are becoming such big fans of stand-up and they want to root on their favorite comedian, and comedians are a voice to the rest of the country.
Speaking of comedic voice, why do you feel like the style of comedy you’re bringing to this awards show is necessary right now for the country? Do you think in those terms?
I just do me, and I think whatever I am has kind of caught up — me and this moment maybe are coming together at the right time. I don’t think I’m intentionally doing anything that I wouldn’t have done even if I didn’t have all these opportunities. But what I like about doing it with stand-up, and why I want to go and do these big shows and tours and all this stuff, is that stand-up’s a newish art form [in terms of] how you see it today. And so I want the next generation of comedians to realize that they can just go be a stand-up comedian. If they wanna go do movies and TV, they can, but they can also make a career out of stand-up.
When I first started, Brian Regan did it, Jim Gaffigan’s been great at it, and Sebastian Maniscalco. But overall a lot of people had TV shows, and they were trying to get a TV show or get into movies or get into whatever the next step was. Now stand-up comedy can stand [on its own] and just be like music. Musicians don’t have to go try to be in movies and stuff — they are musicians. So stand-up comedy, I think, is a great art form that should be portrayed and looked [at on its own]. You’ve got to write it, you gotta direct yourself and perform it. If you get to bring a stand-up comedian on something, it’s just nice because they’ve kind of done everything.
How has clean comedy become the most valuable path for you as you’re growing as not only a comedian but also as someone creating a platform for other comedians?
I want to build that trust so [audiences] know what they can expect — I don’t want to surprise them. Yes, I want to surprise them with the material, but I don’t what to veer off of what got me here. I try to build a thing with [my production company] Nateland, the thing that they can trust and they can go, “All right, I know what this is.” So a lot of people were intimidated by comedy because it can be very dirty — or what they know of it is very dirty — or it can be mean. And you get the audience in to learn about it, and then they can go discover what they want to discover because anything and everything is out there. That’s the big reason, just to get people [into comedy] and aware. Then hopefully this next young generation keeps pounding and keeps doing stand-up.
Did you have pressure to incorporate politics or hot-button issues into your monologue for the Emmys? Or did you just kind of like say, “I’m going to just do me for this”?
There were a couple jokes [written for me] that I’d be like, “I don’t know if I want to say it.” But everybody knows that I wouldn’t. Because you can say stuff in a way that would have broad appeal on [certain controversial issues], but it’s a matter of, “Do I even want to bring it up?” I’m sure people are gonna have speeches and want to say whatever they want to say and they go do it. But for me, I should be the constant palate cleanser. What I think or believe or any of that stuff just doesn’t matter for the purpose of what I’m doing. I’m there to be entertaining and move the show along. So I’ll just do me.
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
If it breaks, then I’ll change it.
Is there advice you may have gotten about hosting awards shows from other comedians?
A lot of it was to “be you, to just do what you do, trust in what you do.” I talked to Nikki Glaser and Conan. Jimmy Kimmel, who I talked to last night, was really wonderful. He wrote a bunch of notes out and really thought it through and was like, “Hey, if this happens, you need to go out there. If something weird happens, you need to go out there as a host. Don’t take a long time, just get out there.” Hopefully nothing weird happens, knock on wood, but it’s if it does, you remind people who you are. Not everybody is gonna know who I am as a stand-up comic. [I was told it’s important to] make that audience in the [room] laugh. I was thinking about the people at home, but it made sense to really want to make [the crowd] laugh, because then the people at home laugh, because then it’s comfortable.
It feels like it’s going to be a noticeably less Hollywood vibe with you hosting, which I think is maybe driving people to be curious about checking out the show.
Yeah, I hope so. That’s the kind of vibe we’re bringing in. I wrote shows, I’ve done all the Hollywood stuff, and we’re starting to make movies now. The Hollywood system — I think it’s a good system, but I was kind of outside of it. I was on the road. I live in Nashville. I just wasn’t in it and so naturally I’m gonna bring something different. A big reason why I moved to Nashville was just because your stand-up is about your life. And I just didn’t want it to be like everybody else’s life. Because then you end up talking about the same things. So you need to go somewhere else to have different experiences so then you have something different to talk about.
You’ve been very connected to Nashville in your comedy and also with Nateland, which you’ve said you want to turn into a theme park in the city. What does that mean to you?
Yes, I want to build a theme park. We had Opryland when I grew up [in Nashville]. Our parents would just drop us off at the theme park, and we would go run around and they would pick us up later on. I want to create a place that has those moments where you can go do that stuff. Nowadays you’re always like, “Where are your kids?” You have to think about them all the time. And you want to try to create a space where these kids can come and you can let them go be 15 and run around without their parents, and you shouldn’t have to worry about it. It’s really just keeping that trust going. That’s the main thing with Nateland. I’m not gonna make all the right moves. I’m not perfect by any sense of the word. But I want you to be able to rely on me that I’m gonna be there.
You also produce podcasts and specials under the Nateland brand and have been very involved in helping the careers of other comics. Why is that important for you?
I feel like when I came up, I was lucky. [Jimmy] Fallon was great to me, Marc Maron was a great, I had [Jim] Gaffigan. I had people that were very nice and very helpful and very great. But when you’re in this [business], I don’t think everybody’s always looking to help you. And then people don’t get out of the way. And then it’s not always like everything moves accordingly. It used to just be that you’re a comic, then you would try to get a sitcom, you moved to L.A. And then the next group comes up. But you can get kind of stuck in this system where no one’s moving, no one is changing. Then the alt-comedy scene got started because all of us trying to get in [to perform at] clubs had to go a different route because we couldn’t get into the clubs. It was almost like too many of us at the same time in this clogged-up system. I look back at it and it’s frustrating. On the path I took, I’ve done every show you could do. I’ve performed [in front of] one guy and [also in front of] 20,000 people. So now I just have all the stuff that I’ve done, and you just wanna give it to the next generation [of comics] — [I try to] keep an eye out on them and try to help them.
What is your barometer for how well you perform on Sunday night?
They asked me if I had a creative way to try to keep speeches short besides just playing people off to music — because they ignore the music. And so then I came up with a way where I’m gonna donate $100,000 to Boys & Girls Club of America and then everybody gets 45 seconds for their thank-yous. Every second they go over, we take away $1,000 from the Boys & Girls Club.
And we got Boys & Girls Club kids coming out there. So if everybody’s going over, you’re gonna have to look at these kids. But you can also put time back on. So if you do a 20-second speech, you can throw $25,000 back on top of whatever [the total dollar amount] is. That will be a fun barometer. I’m hoping that is such an outside-of-the-system kind of thinking. Because I’ve got to give this money, so how much is it going to be? Is it going to be $10,000 because everybody went over? Is it gonna be way more? I hope everybody just has fun, and I think that’s a running thing — a tally that could be fun, and I don’t want to be disrespectful. I know people worked hard and they want to give their thank-yous. I would have liked to give my thank-yous, but I lost. If everybody comes back saying, “Dude, that was so fun,” that’s the barometer. They’re probably not even saying that much to me, just “Dude, that was best, it was very fun to watch.” And then I’m like, “All right, thanks,” and hopefully I entertained people. That’s the job, the best job ever, by far.
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