After a week of Black-ass celebration, we’ve made it to the main event! The 52nd NAACP Awards televised ceremony took place on Saturday night and we have some highlights to...highlight!
We already broke down the past week of winners at the non-televised/virtual ceremony so if you missed that, we got you boo!
In a half-virtual/half-in-studio event, host Anthony Anderson (and 2021 Image Award winner!) joked that he was there for the “fifty-eleventh” time and that the double-A in NAACP stands for “Anthony Anderson.”
Jazmine Sullivan gave us beautiful blue hues during her performance of “Pick Up Your Feelings.”
Maxwell celebrated 25 years since his debut album Urban Hang Suite by giving us New York noir and performing the jam, “Ascension.”
As we continue to have conversations about the erasure of Black stories by mainstream (read: white) awards ceremonies, it’s always a special feeling to be celebrated by folks in your own community and the winners absolutely had that energy on Saturday night.
Speaking of joy, Issa Rae—who has provided us with laughs and other entertainment for years—chatted a bit with the The Root during the winners’ press conference and told us what brings her laughs and joy: Big Mouth!
“Outside of my friends and my group chats—Big Mouth has been a pleasant surprise and I only kind of learned about it and [recently] started checking for it,” Rae told The Root. “I’ve been a fan of [co-creator] Nick Kroll, I love him. But, when Quinta [Brunson] and Lena [Waithe] were on there [...] I started watching the show and it’s so hilarious! It is funny as hell and that has been a pleasant surprise of entertainment during this pandemic. It’s been a comfort zone for me.”
Also, I have to mention that this ceremony was two hours—nice and breezy! I need all award shows to be this short, to be honest! Granted, the reason why the NAACP was able to pull this off is because they’ve been celebrating the bulk of their award winners during mini-virtual events all week as we mentioned above, but maybe that should be the way to go moving forward!
The complete list of winners from the 52nd NAACP Image Awards televised ceremony are:
Outstanding Actor in a Drama Series
Regé-Jean Page – Bridgerton
Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series
Viola Davis – How To Get Away With Murder
Outstanding Actress in a Comedy Series
Issa Rae – Insecure
Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture
Viola Davis – Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture
Chadwick Boseman – Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Outstanding Motion Picture
“Bad Boys For Life”
Chairman’s Award
Rev. D. James Lawson
Presidents Award
LeBron James
Hall of Fame Award
Eddie Murphy
Entertainer of the Year
D-Nice
Social Justice Impact
Stacey Abrams
You can view the complete list of the 52nd NAACP Image Awards winners and nominees at naacpimageawards.net.