Queen Elizabeth II won a posthumous BAFTA for her skit with Paddington
A beloved British icon won a BAFTA, and so did the Queen
To the daft or the knackered, the BAFTA TV awards are just the U.K.’s Emmys, but real fans know that there’s more to it than that—where else will you find whatever “Reality & Constructed Factual” is? Or whatever “Sport” is? It’s called “sports,” you goofballs! You play plural sports and you learn singular math, not the other way around!
Anyway, one of the BAFTA TV categories is “Memorable Moment,” which (unlike Reality & Constructed Factual) is exactly what it sounds like: The best general thing that happened on TV (or “the telly”) in the past year. It’s also the only award voted on by the public, which means it counts more than all of the other categories, and so it’s fitting that this year’s winner involved the one thing that can bring all citizens of the United Kingdom together.
Yes, the winner of this year’s Memorable Moment BAFTA TV award was the little skit from Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee wherein she had tea with Paddington—and while giving Her Royal Majesty a posthumous BAFTA face is surely the headline the British government wants to sell, this definitely happened because of Paddington, right?
(Does Paddington pay for Twitter?)
Here’s the clip if you want to see it for yourself, including a performance from the Queen that feels weirdly on a similar level as Ben Whishaw’s little bear.
Paddington (and also the Queen) beat some stiff competition for the award, including Nick and Charlie’s first kiss in Heartstopper, the “Running Up That Hill” scene in Stranger Things, and the big vote at the end of Derry Girls. In addition to sharing that BAFTA with the Queen, Whishaw also won a BAFTA of his own for starring in This Is Going To Hurt. The Queen and her Platinum Jubilee also won the “Live Event” BAFTA, giving her another posthumous win this year, beating out ITV’s Concert For Ukraine special and… the Queen’s… you know… funeral. It might’ve been a little awkward if that had been the one to win.