Sunday's win marks the fourth consecutive outstanding drama series Emmy for AMC's period drama.
PHOTOS: 2011 Primetime Emmy Awards Red Carpet Arrivals
STORY: Emmy Winners React
Mad Men showrunner Matthew Weiner was still in shock — not just that the show took home the top prize for a drama series — but that it tied Hillstreet Blues, L.A. Law and The West Wing as the only shows to have won the statuette four times.
PHOTOS: Emmy Winners 2011
“I have not absorbed that yet,” Weiner told reporters backstage Sunday. “I’m a huge fan of TV and watched all those shows … it’s hard to comprehend that we’re in that company, it really is.”
Weiner noted that the win this year meant more to him because so many people had predicted that the series wouldn’t take home the prize as it faced stiff competition from the likes of Game of Thrones, Boardwalk Empire, Dexter, Friday Night Lights and The Good Wife.
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“I actually heard a lot of, ‘We loved the show last year but you’re not going to win,’” he said. “I was disheartened but also we can’t go on forever. I made peace with the fact that we might lose and then we didn’t and I’m really happy.”
Asked whether this year’s win meant more coming after prolonged contract negotiations, Weiner noted that the “sweetest thing is we get to go back and make 39 more episodes of this show, [the Emmy] is gravy.”
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Noting that he’s working with the “greatest cast in TV right now,” Weiner noted that being shutout of the writing and acting categories “happens.” “We were shut out and then we won this award — to me, this is the prize that says people love what we’re doing.”
Weiner, who noted that he’s superstitious and thought that new mom January Jones’ absence would be bad for the show, added that co-star John Slattery checked in with her. Said Weiner: “She said her baby had his fingers crossed.”
Meanwhile, after Christina Hendricks deflected a question asking her to discuss her figure, Weiner stepped in and turned into a comedian: “Don’t you want to ask me that question?” he chuckled. “I work out a lot.”
