This post originally appeared on the Nashville Scene blog.
Tomorrow night, Nashville's own stable of celebrity helmetheads will gather at the new Schermerhorn Symphony Center for the 21st Annual Midsouth Regional Emmy Awards. It's a chance for the city's best and brightest television journalists—or at least those who've forked over the most dough—to take home a golden Emmy of their very own.
There's a reason the famed golden statuettes hold so much prestige in television news... They cost someone a shitload of money. See for yourself: Cost to enter a news story/program for Emmy consideration: $60-per-entrant membership fee in NATAS, plus $65 per person involved in the entry, per category. With 60 categories to choose from, certain news reporters and photographer/editors will submit as many as 10 entries, often footing all or most of the bill alone.
Cost to attend the Emmy Awards Ceremony: $90 per person. Traditionally, it is the worst meal in town (prompting many variations of the game What I Could've Done with $90 Besides Come Here), although in a new venue this year, who knows? Things may be different.
Cost to valet park at the Schermerhorn:: $15.
Come on. I realize that Bob Mueller is a well-known playboy high roller who can afford to toss Lincolns around like candy, but give some consideration to the little people and their little car parking budgets.
Cost for Emmy "Special Rate" at the Downtown Hilton: $135.
Most local news types will hightail it home after the awards ceremony, but the hapless souls who were nominated from Charlotte, Knoxville and Memphis are obliged to stay overnight.
Add in the cost of eveningwear and post-dinner drinks downtown and you can expect a night somewhere in the neighborhood of about $500 per person when it's all said and done. Don't be surprised to see some of your favorite young reporters get even thinner over the next few months as they subsist on Ramen in order to pay off those pesky Emmy debts incurred from the Dillards Jessica McClintock department.
Despite its exhorbitant cost, I will say that the Emmy Award is not entirely useless. A surprisingly heavy award, it may come in handy when some of the TV journalatti find themselves fending off autograph requests from drunken tourists downtown. East Nashvillians may even want to keep their Emmy just inside the front door; the wings on that sucker could do some serious damage to a would-be home invader.
At any rate, you can see the glamour, the glitz, the pageantry for yourself tomorrow night, LIVE, (and yes, I suppose that means nipple slips are entirely possible) at 8pm on WNPT. While I've yet to see an actual wardrobe malfunction on stage, I can almost guarantee that someone will give an acceptance speech drunk. I hate to encroach on Jim Ridley's weekend viewing suggestions, but I had a feeling he would want me to share this with all of you.