TV cops unite at 2024 Emmys to remind us 'you can't fight crime if you ain't cute'

Jimmy Smits, Don Johnson, and Niecy Nash-Betts linked up to present the award for Best Actor in a Limited Series.

The only profession television respects more than doctors is, well, police. So an hour or two after the 2024 Emmys honored the rich tradition of TV MDs with Mindy Kaling, Zach Braff, and Mekhi Phifer, the ceremony brought some iconic TV cops on stage to present the award for Best Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie.

As Jimmy Smits was the first to point out when he came on stage alongside Don Johnson and Niecy Nash-Betts, they all represented very different archetypes of TV cops. As Bobby Simone on NYPD Blue, Smits played a "strong, sensitive, street-smart type who had to rein in his very eccentric partner." On the other end of the spectrum was Nash-Betts' Raineesha Williams on Reno 911.

"Raineesha brought two important things to being a cop," Nash-Betts said. "A marginal knowledge of the law and the belief that you can't fight crime if you ain't cute."

Related: Emmys 2024: See the complete list of winners

And then there's Johnson's Sonny Crockett, one half of the central duo on Miami Vice, "who played by his own rules, which always conflicted with orders from his superiors, but in the end his methods were effective and he always brought the bad guy to justice."

As Johnson noted, Crockett was only one of the cops he's played over the years. He recently returned to the fictionalized profession as villainous police chief Sandy Burnne in the Netflix film Rebel Ridge.

Smits couldn't help but mention their brief overlap, when he briefly played Crockett's first partner who gets killed by a car bomb in the Miami Vice premiere. "You were spectacular in those 30 seconds!" Johnson said. "It got you NYPD Blue."

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Although the TV dads who assembled earlier in the show (George Lopez, Damon Wayans, and Jesse Tyler Ferguson) made a point of thanking the actors who played their spouses, these TV cops did not directly mention their partners, like NYPD Blue's Dennis Franz or Miami Vice's Philip Michael Thomas.

The only TV cop nominated for the category in question this year was Jon Hamm, who played Sheriff Roy Tillman on season 5 of Fargo. The other nominees included Matt Bomer (Fellow Travelers), Tom Hollander (Feud: Capote vs. the Swans), and Andrew Scott (Ripley). But the victory went to Baby Reindeer mastermind Richard Gadd. No one was more surprised by this outcome than Gadd himself.

Related: Jimmy Smits: Why can't the beloved TV actor catch a break in primetime?

"You're all crazy, obviously," Gadd said to begin his acceptance speech. "Thank you so much, honestly. I wasn't expecting this one at all and didn't prepare. Jon Hamm, I'm your biggest fan! As I told you last night, over and over again."

Gadd had already given a heartfelt speech when he won earlier in the night for Outstanding Writing for a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie, and this wasn't even his last time on stage: He returned again a little later when Baby Reindeer won Best Limited or Anthology Series or Movie.

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