Emmys: Ken Jeong and Joel McHale Poke Fun at Jo Koy’s Golden Globes Monologue

Ken Jeong and Joel McHale couldn’t resist poking fun at Jo Koy when they took the stage at the Emmy Awards on Monday night. Koy hosted the Golden Globes earlier this month and most of his jokes fell flat, and he drew a lot of criticism when he blamed the poor reaction on his writers. When Jeong and McHale presented the award for Outstanding Reality-Competition Program, they teased Koy on their on-stage banter.

McHale set up the bit with a joke that Jeong did not quit working as a doctor to get into comedy, but was instead kicked out of the medical profession for killing a patient. Playing along, Jeong said that it was not his fault, saying: “The instruments that almost killed that dude were the ones the nurses left in, okay? The ones that saved his life are the ones I left in. And besides, I only had the gig for 10 days at that point.”

This joke was a clear reference to Koy’s opening monologue at the Golden Globes, where he went off script to tell the audience: “I got the gig 10 days ago.” Acknowledging that his jokes weren’t landing, he also said: “You want a perfect monologue? Shut up! You are kidding me, right? Slow down. I wrote some of these and they’re the ones you’re laughing at.”

McHale and Jeong aren’t the first ones to parody Koy as award season moves on. Koy’s ex-girlfriend Chelse Handler may have actually been the first, as she hosted the Critics Choice Awards on Sunday. After one joke got particularly strong laughs, she inverted Koy’s excuse by saying: “Thank you for laughing at that – my writers wrote it.”

Koy did seem to regret throwing his writers under the bus when reflecting on the Golden Globes a few days later. In an interview with The L.A. Times, he said: “Thank you for laughing at that — my writers wrote it.”

The Times report also put Koy’s 10-day preparation time into perspective, noting that many award show hosts get months to prepare for those kinds of gigs in advance. That includes time to work closely with writers to develop a clear voice that matches the host’s style. However, other industry insiders said that it was still unprofessional for Koy to condemn the writers like that.

Koy joked about the Golden Globes himself when he kicked off his stand-up world tour last week. He seemed to imply that he got a poor reception because the live audience didn’t have a good sense of humor. He said: “Lots of marshmallows, man. They’re delicious, but goddamn, they’re soft. I just come from a different time. I see the changes that are happening. I get it, but goddamn, can we f-ing laugh at ourselves?”