Monday, September 25, 2017

Black Mirror / San Junipero wins at Emmys, as Charlie Brooker urges crowd to 'physically make love'

















 




Netflix's sci-fi anthology series Black Mirror took two awards at last night's Primetime Emmys, with show creator Charlie Brooker winning both Outstanding Television Movie and an Outstanding Writing award for the episode San Junipero, a futuristic love story.
In an amusing acceptance speech, Brooker said that many Black Mirror fans had seen parallels between its dark, dystopian satire and current events. 
“I have heard 2017 described as being trapped, like being trapped in one long unending ‘Black Mirror’ episode,” he said. “But I like to think if I had written it, it wouldn’t be quite so on the nose with all the Nazis and hate.”
The winning episode, San Junipero, was a stark departure from the show's usual blend of sci-fi and horror. Starring Mackenzie Davis and Gugu Mbatha-Raw, it offered an optimistic vision of how technology can help deal with aging and loneliness.  “San Junipero was a story about love – and love will defeat hatred, love will win," Brooker told the Emmys audience.
"But it might need a bit of help," he continued, before earning a laugh from the crowd with a surreal request: "Maybe, if all the beautiful people in this auditorium could start to physically make love with each other – or yourselves – on the count of three, this world would be a far better place. Three, two, one, go!” 










Mackenzie Davis and Gugu Mbatha-Raw in Black Mirror: San Junipero CREDIT: NETFLIX
Speaking to the Telegraph in February, Brooker said that writing the episode "terrified" him, as it was so different to his usual metier. "I was worried about it when writing it, because I've not really written a romance before," he said.
The British drama moved to Netflix for its latest series, after two series on Channel 4. "San Junipero was the first one I wrote for the Netflix season, and I was consciously trying to clear the decks on what Black Mirror was," Brooker said. "And the world is in a place at the moment where I think maybe people appreciate things that aren't so unremittingly horrible."
Other winners at last night's awards ceremony included The Handmaid's Tale, which won five awards, and Saturday Night Live, which won four.

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