Celebrities sweat before Emmys but not from nerves

Grey's Anatomy star Sandra Oh feels the heat. Picture / Reuters

LOS ANGELES - If the 58th annual Emmy Awards proved one thing, it's that the stars are human. They sweat just like the rest of us.

Television stars weren't perspiring from pre-award show nerves on the red carpet on Sunday but rather from sweltering California heat that brought out handkerchiefs and hand-held fans. The heat caused hairdos to droop and made inelegant stains on glamorous silk gowns.

"It's hotter than a 10 cent cigar," said comedian Stephen Colbert of The Colbert Report.

"I'm sorry I'm sweating, it's too hot," said actress Jennifer Love Hewitt. "We should be in Emmy bikinis."

Supermodel Tyra Banks of the reality show America's Top Model, had her face dabbed by a handler as she made her way down the red carpet, while a nearby reporter fainted from standing in the heat, bringing out the paramedics.

In a TV Guide tent in the shade, comedian Joan Rivers, wearing black, performed the 1000th interview of her career on the red carpet with Will & Grace's Debra Messing.

"Tyra Banks was beyond beautiful but her back was like the Nile River," Rivers said. "Everybody was sweating it was so awful. It was the cruelest thing they could do to any woman."

"I died," Rivers added. "I think I've lost 3 pounds --- I'm very, very happy. I thought of it as work and a spa."

Rivers said the heat really didn't bother her if taking the long view. "My career is such a lucky career -- somewhere in a previous life I washed lepers' feet. I bet the lepers were in Manolo Blahniks (expensive designer shoes)."

- REUTERS