Fan favorite and newly minted Emmy award winner Uzo Aduba is going home with more than a golden trophy.
The “Orange Is The New Black” star has become the second in history to win a Best Actor or Actress Emmy in both the drama and comedy categories — thanks to the Netflix series switch to dramatic competition for 2015.
Host Andy Samberg opened the show with a joke referencing the possible record saying it confirmed his theory that, “Uzo Aduba is the new Ed Asner.”
A tearful Aduba got emotion running high at Downtown LA’s Microsoft Theater, overcome with gratitude for the role — which she told TheWrap she landed the day she decided to leave show business for good.
Aduba, who plays Suzanne “Crazy Eyes” Warren, thanked creator Jenji Kohan “for creating the space, for creating a platform” to tell complex stories about women of all walks of life.
Through tears she said Kohan “put belief back in my heart,” thanked her cast and crew and tearfully paid tribute to her family.
Of her professional team, agent and lawyer and the like, she thanked most poignantly, saying simply — “I love you mostly because you let me be me.”
Previously, Asner was the only actor to win an Emmy Award for a sitcom and a drama for the same role, as Lou Grant on the “Mary Tyler Moore” show and “Lou Grant.”
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