Emmy Awards Host Nate Bargatze Is A Clean Comic & Christian

On Sunday, Sept. 14, CBS takes its turn to air the Emmy Awards, for the 77th edition.

Hosting awards shows has become kind of a minefield these days, so CBS has made the radical decision to use Nate Bargatze, a clean comedian from Nashville who’s also a Christian.

Right? I couldn’t believe it, either.

But it’s such a CBS thing to do.

NOTE: You can watch the Emmy Awards live on Sunday at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT, on your local CBS affiliate and CBS’ streaming sibling, Paramount+, but ONLY if you have a Paramount+ Premium subscription.

From NerdsThatGeek.com:

On that note, the 77th Annual Emmy Awards® will be available to stream live on Paramount+ only for Paramount+ Premium subscribers via the live feed of their local CBS affiliate service and on demand. So, if you have a Paramount+ Essential account, you will not have the option to stream the show live, but you will have access to view the special on demand the day after the special airs, in the U.S. only.

The Problem With Awards Hosts

In recent years, the various networks have fallen over themselves trying to get more and more “edgy” hosts for awards shows. Then, having that blow up in their faces, they’ve even occasionally opted for no host.

But there’s something interesting about CBS.

For the last 17 consecutive years, CBS has been the number-one network in total viewers. But, before you say, “It’s just because it has Sunday football!,” CBS had a 16-year streak from 1955-1970, before the NFL was the juggernaut it is today.

It’s done this by aiming right for the broad, mainstream audience, with plenty of procedural dramas and family-centric comedies. With other networks chasing elusive demographics and hip urbanites, CBS is generally happy with adults 25-54, no matter where they live.

In other words, CBS loves all adult Americans, provided they have access to broadcast television.

So, Who Is Nate Bargatze?

So, when the Emmys came around, in moment that’s especially fraught, with social upheaval, political controversy, and tragically, attempted and actual political assassinations, CBS went home for the Emmys — down home.

But don’t get me wrong, the only thing CBS may be risking by having Bargatze as host of the Emmys is its possible seat at the cool-kids’ table.

The Grammy-nominated comedian, author, podcaster, director and producer is filling comedy venues around the country, selling more than 1.2M tickets in 2024. According to Pollstar, he’s currently the #1-earning stand-up comedian in the world.

And Bargatze has done all of this with everyman looks, a deadpan delivery, a laser focus on the absurdities of daily life — and absolutely no double-entendres or cussing.

While kids may not get all the jokes, parents don’t need to shoo them out of the room.

Bargatze has had specials on Prime Video and Netflix, and last year, was host of his own CBS holiday special, Nate Bargatze’s Nashville Christmas.

It’s not exactly the Tabernacle Choir or Midnight Mass from the Vatican, but it’s pretty funny — even as it takes a mildly irreverent look at the Nativity.

Bargatze has hosted Saturday Night Live twice, including this appearance as George Washington.

He even was just profiled on CBS Sunday Morning:

Bargatze Heads to the Big Screen With Wonder Project

Bargatze also has a family-friendly feature comedy called The Breadwinner, coming out in March, 2026.

Co-starring Mandy Moore, Will Forte, Colin Jost, Zach Cherry and Kumail Nanjiani, it stars Bargatze as a guy whose entrepreneurial wife (Moore) lands a deal on Shark Tank. This relegates the former family breadwinner to the status of stay-at-home dad — and it doesn’t go well.

The film is coming from faith-based production company Wonder Project (House of David), in partnership with TriStar Pictures.

Bargatze, a Christian But Not a Church Comic

A success despite the lack of swearing, crude material or sexual references in his comedy, Bargatze draws his material from relatable, everyday events, rather than talking specifically about church life.

But he did grow up with faith. As he told Fox News Digital:

“It’s how I grew up,” he said. “I grew up that way. I come from a Christian family and Southern Christian, so I wasn’t allowed to watch anything, which I talk about in the special. And so growing up and only watching clean comedians, it was just how I was going to be. And it would feel forced if I was not.”

Also, from Movieguide:

Nate Bargatze is grateful to God for putting a fellow Christian comedian in his life early on in his career.

“God [is] watching me all the time — the fact that He put me with you,” Bargatze said during an episode of Anjelah Johnson-Reyes’s FUNJELAH podcast. “Because, imagine if — I could have went out with so many other comics that do not have God in their life and are just dudes that are going to be dumb and whatever.

That could have been — we were together so long, that could have spiraled me into a whole other realm, but He put me with you, someone that was like-minded with me.”

And, from The New York Times’ The Interview podcast, via FoxNews.com:

“It’s a big belief: I am second to God. Second to your family, second to the audience, second to everybody. You live to serve, so it’s very much a calling in that aspect. But it’s trying to ride that balance where I don’t want anybody that’s not this or that — I just want to make something where all of them can be in the room together.

It’s driven by a bigger purpose for me, but everybody has their own things,” he said.

So, Bargatze isn’t there to preach to anyone, he’s just sharing the funny side of ordinary life. He’s there to make jokes for regular Americans between 25 and 54 — and anyone else who tunes in.

And Now, the Emmys

Not too sure how the hip, cool celebs at the Emmys are going to handle Bargatze, but at least families don’t have to turn the sound off during the opening monologue.

Acceptance speeches, though, you’re on your own — but as you can hear in the clip below, Bargatze has a plan for that.