Acceptance speeches are the whole reason for tuning into awards shows, but producers are always worried about them delaying the show. So at the 2023 Emmys this weekend, the ceremony recruited a specific person to monitor winners' speech times — and she has a special connection to the show's host.

While Anthony Anderson handles MC duties at this year's Emmys ceremony (which was rescheduled from last fall due to the Hollywood strikes), he recruited his real-life mother, Doris Bowman, to be the show's "play-off mama." She's previously served as her son's sidekick on the various game shows he hosts, like We Are Family.

Not every speech can be kept short, of course. Some of the best Emmys moments come when a winner insists on having enough time to speak their truth, like Abbott Elementary star Sheryl Lee Ralph did at the 2022 Emmys. In Anderson's opening monologue, we got a sense of what that will look like if anyone tries tonight.

After noting that everyone tends to ignore play-off music, Anderson declared on stage, "Now I’ve got something no one can ignore: My mama."

Doris Bowman and Anthony Anderson.

Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

Anderson continued, "If you see my mama, just thank Jesus and your family, and wrap it up. I don’t want anyone to get disrespectful with my mama, because she is from the west side of Chicago.”

But then Bowman stood up from her seat behind Shrinking star Harrison Ford to interrupt her son: “Shut your mouth! I want to go to the afterparties!”  

"You're supposed to be yelling at the other people, not at me!" Anderson retorted. "Not in the middle of the monologue!"

Nevertheless, he obeyed her orders to "wrap it up."

Later in the show, when John Oliver won for Outstanding Scripted Variety Series (his first time in that category, after winning Outstanding Talk Series eight years in a row), he insisted on being played off by Bowman.

“The worst part of an award show is having to cut off people’s speeches,” Emmys producer Dionne Harmon told Variety earlier in the week. “And so, Anthony’s mom is going to help us. She’ll pop her head around the side and tap her watch. You’ll know that you’ve got to wrap it up. She’s excited about it, and I think it’ll be an interesting twist that we haven’t seen on an award show like this.”

See all the 2023 Emmys winners here.

Check out more from EW's TheAwardist, featuring exclusive interviews, analysis, and our podcast diving into all the highlights from the year's best films, TV, and music.

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