Emmy Awards: Succession creator sends ‘un-thank-you’ messages to Donald Trump and Boris Johnson

Succession creator Jesse Armstrong didn’t pull any punches in his acceptance speech for his hit HBO series winning Oustanding Drama Series at the Emmys.

Armstrong, 48, was at a hotel in London when he accepted the Emmy, beating out Better Call Saul, Killing Eve, Ozark, Stranger Things, The Crown, The Handmaid’s Tale and The Mandalorian on Sunday night.

His speech was the last of the night, the seventh win in total for Succession on the night, when Armstrong took aim at the political leaders of the United States and his native United Kingdom: Donald Trump and Boris Johnson. 

‘Thank you very much indeed. This is such a very nice moment and it’s very sad not to be with the cast and some of the crew to share it with you all tonight, but this is a wonderful achievement for the whole group,’ Armstrong said.

His speech was briefly interrupted by a telephone ringing, with Armstrong quipping, ‘Room service, probably,’ as Kieran Culkin was seen laughing in another video.

‘But for being robbed of the opportunity to spend this time with our peers and with the cast and crew, I think I’d maybe like to do some un-thank yous,’ Armstrong added.

‘Un-thank you to the virus for keeping us all apart this year. Un-thank you to Trump for his crummy and uncoordinated response, un-thank you to Boris Johnson and his government for doing the same in my country,’ he added.

He added, ‘un-thank you to all the nationalist and quasi-nationalist governments in the world that are exactly the opposite of what we need right now and un-thank you to the media moguls who do so much to keep them in power. So un-thank you,’ he concluded.

After the ceremony ended, Armstrong revealed his celebratory plans in the U.K. involved grabbing some breakfast.

‘(I’m) hopefully by going to breakfast because it’s 4 a.m. [in the U.K.] and in case something positive happened I didn’t drink anything so I’m hoping for a champagne breakfast with this lovely group,’ he said.

Armstrong added, ‘It’s the kind of celebration an old person would have’ after the ceremony.

Armstrong’s hit series Succession took home seven Emmys out of 18 nominations in its second season at HBO. 

Jeremy Strong won Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series for his portrayal of Kendall Roy, with Cherry Jones winning Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series at the Creative Arts Emmys last week.

Armstrong himself won for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series for the episode This Is Not For Tears.

Director Andrij Parekh won Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for the episode entitled Hunting.

Succession also scored Creative Arts Emmy wins for Outstanding Casting For a Drama Series (Avy Kaufman) and Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Drama Series (William Henry, Venya Bruk).