Pressly is ready for slapstick
By Mike Hughes, GANNETT NEWS SERVICE, September 22, 2007

Some moves seem terribly logical after they happen. One was making Jaime Pressly a situation-comedy star.

These days, Pressly savors her “My Name is Earl” role. She plays Joy, sexy, selfish and single-minded.

“She’s very strong-minded and says what she’s thinking,” Pressly says. “That’s just the way Joy is.”

Pressly has mastered her persona. That includes a generic accent because the producers didn’t want a specific locale.

In each of the first two seasons, she’s had Emmy nominations as best supporting actress in a comedy. (She was a winner Sept. 16.)

It’s also new turf for her. Pressly’s first two series — “Push” and “Jack & Jill” — were angst-filled dramas; “Earl” is closer to her natural state.

“I come from a very funny family,” she says. “All the Pressly men were funny.”

They were businessmen in Kinston, N.C., but they knew how to have fun.

“My dad would tell these great stories, where every character had a different accent . . . We laughed at each other, all day,” she says.

What she took seriously was dancing, modeling and acting. Pressly ended up in a lot of crime-show episodes.

Then came the “Earl” script.

“It read like an independent short,” Pressly recalls. “I said, “This is not going to make it unless it has an amazing Earl.’ ”

It has one in Jason Lee. Pressly, however, is the one with the Emmy nominations.

In the first season, “Earl” won Emmys for the writing, directing and casting of its pilot and for the editing of another episode. Pressly was the show’s only nominated actor.

In the second season, it had two nominations for guest stars (Beau Bridges and Giovanni Ribisi), two for editing and one for sound-mixing. Pressly was the only nominated regular.

“Earl” may not win enough Emmys, but it would win any contest involving body balance. Lee is a former skateboard champion; Pressly is a former dancer and gymnast.

Last season, she had to hold off on the sight gags because she was pregnant. Pressly says she and her fiance, Eric Cubiche, planned that as precisely as possible. Their son, Dezi, was born May 11, shortly after the season was done.

From the Ashbury Park Press

The second season of My Name Is Earl is now available for purchase on DVD! You can order your copy from Amazon or pick it up at your favorite local retailer.

‘Very funny family’ prepared Pressly for role

By Mike Hughes, GANNETT NEWS SERVICE, September 17, 2007

Some moves seem terribly logical after they happen. One was making Jaime Pressly a situation-comedy star.

These days, Pressly savors her “My Name is Earl” role. She plays Joy, sexy, selfish, and single-minded.

“She’s very strong-minded and says what she’s thinking,” Pressly says. “That’s just the way Joy is.”

Pressly has mastered her persona. That includes a generic accent, because the producers didn’t want a specific locale.

In each of the first two seasons, she’s had Emmy nominations as best supporting actress in a comedy. It’s a category without a front-runner, which would seem to give her a decent shot at winning.

It’s also new turf for her. Pressly’s first two series — “Push” and “Jack & Jill” — were angst-filled dramas; “Earl” is closer to her natural state.

“I come from a very funny family,” she says. “All the Pressly men were funny.”

They were businessmen in Kinston, N.C., but they knew how to have fun. “My dad would tell these great stories, where every character had a different accent … We laughed at each other, all day.”

What she took seriously was dancing, modeling and acting. Pressly ended up in a lot of crime-show episodes.

Then came the “Earl” script.

“It read like an independent short,” Pressly recalls. “I said, ‘This is not going to make it unless it has an amazing Earl.’”

It has one in Jason Lee. Pressly, however, is the one with the Emmy nominations.

In the first season, “Earl” won Emmys for the writing, directing and casting of its pilot and for the editing of another episode. Pressly was the show’s only nominated actor.

In the second season, it had two nominations for guest stars (Beau Bridges and Giovanni Ribisi), two for editing and one for sound-mixing. Pressly is the only nominated regular.

“Earl” would win any contest involving body balance. Lee is a former skateboard champion; Pressly is a former dancer and gymnast.

Last season, she had to hold off on the sight gags because she was pregnant. Pressly says she and her fiancé, Eric Cubiche, planned that as precisely as possible. Their son, Dezi, was born May 11, shortly after the season was done.

Pressly was back for the new season ready for fairly long days. “This year, it’s like a well-oiled machine,” she says.

Besides, she’s working with people who have been doing this awhile.

“This is this great set of people,” Pressly says. “I think of them as like old rock stars … We laugh all day.”

From Delaware Online

Father & Friends React To Jaime Pressly Emmy

WITN, September 17, 2007

Call it a little bit of Hollywood right here in eastern North Carolina.

Kinston native Jaime Pressly took home the Emmy Sunday night for best supporting actress in a comedy for NBC’s “My Name Is Earl,” seen on WITN Thursday nights.

Those who know her best say it’s her spirit that took Pressly from Tarheel blue to the TV screen. Rhondra Fleming says Pressly would probably have been an athlete if not an actress. Fleming was Pressly’s 1991 cheerleading coach at Rochelle Middle School in Kinston. Her father Jimmy, who still calls Kinston home, says he’s proud that all her hard work has paid off, saying “I’m proud of her, she didn’t ever give up. She kept right on struggling, because it wasn’t easy, but last year she got nominated, this year she got nominated, but this year she won.”

Born in Kinston in 1977, Pressly made her acting debut starring as a waitress in the 1997 action thriller “Against The Law.”

From WITN

I’ve added some images for members to check out in the gallery. Please sign in or register to view them. Jaime looked amazing at tonight’s awards, so the HQ’s are really great! Click on the thumbnails to be taken to the gallery.

Jaime has won the Emmy award for “Best Supporting Actress in Comedy” at the 2007 Emmy Awards! Congrats to Jaime! Here’s a cute little blurb from backstage, thanks to CNN:

Outstanding supporting actress in a comedy series Jaime Pressly — a first-time Emmy winner — talked more about her excitement for her new family (she recently gave birth to her first child) than about her Emmy for her work on “My Name Is Earl.”

Regarding her golden statue and where she planned to display it in her home, she said, “I didn’t plan on winning it, so I didn’t plan on putting it anywhere.”

What a great way to end a Sunday, huh? I’ll be adding pictures and stuff into the gallery later on. For now enjoy the picture of Jaime and her Emmy! :D

I finally found time to create a “layout” for the new interface. I love this picture of Jaime and I think it fits the color and feel of everything. :D Somehow, the coding is bit wonky, I’ll fiddle around with it when I get more time, but at least you can still read everything! Comment on the header if you like it. ;)

The Emmy Awards never quite manage to get it all the way right.

They can honor Julia Louis-Dreyfus for the low-rated rookie series “The New Adventures of Old Christine,” but only after celebrating Candice Bergen year after year for “Murphy Brown.”

They can honor James Gandolfini and Edie Falco as outstanding actor and actress in a drama, but not in the same year “The Sopranos” wins for outstanding dramatic series — and vice versa.

Last year, the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences produced a miserable slate of nominees snubbing previous winners Gandolfini, Falco, Felicity Huffman of “Desperate Housewives” and what was then the defending top drama, “Lost.” Yet, just when everyone was ready to write off the Emmys, they saved face at the actual award ceremony by honoring Louis-Dreyfus and naming “The Office” top comedy.

This year, the ATAS has somehow produced a top-rate slate of nominees. Sure, I could carp about the utter absence of “The Wire” and “The Shield,” as well as Kristen Bell of “Veronica Mars” and the continued ghettofication of top comedies “South Park” and “The Simpsons” in the animation category. But the 59th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards, airing at 7 p.m. Sunday on WFLD Channel 32 from the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, will feature several interesting races, many pitting excellent cable series against popular broadcast favorites.

The question is, will the academy complete the deal by making mostly correct choices, or mess it up again by picking, say, overrated Emmy favorite David E. Kelley’s “Boston Legal” and James Spader over the brilliant swan song of David Chase’s “Sopranos” and Gandolfini?

Look at it this way: The ATAS has already chosen “American Idol” shill Ryan Seacrest as this year’s host (a product of Fox drawing the broadcast assignment), so things are off going in.

Yet here’s a look at the top races, in drama and comedy, and how the academy can get the rest of the night right — or go horribly wrong.

Best supporting actress

This six-person category really comes down to two top contenders: Jaime Pressly of “My Name Is Earl” and Jenna Fischer of “The Office.” To discerning eyes, Pressly regressed last season, so Fischer should win, but I think the Emmy will go to Pressly — unless it goes to Conchata Ferrell of “Men,” who might serve as a Tyne Daly stand-in for the Emmy old guard.

To read the rest of the article, check out The Daily Herald