The MTV Video Music Awards, considered to be one of the most prestigious video music awards across the globe, was held on 30th August 2020.Keke Palmer hosted this 37th annual ceremony, held in COVID safe outdoor arenas across New York City. This event was held virtually this year due to the COVID-19 outbreak. It was one of the first award shows that was held after the global pandemic.

This year Lady Gaga bagged five awards, which was the maximum number of awards received in this season. Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga were the most nominated, with nine nominations each. Gaga received the inaugural MTV Tricon award for achievements in three (or more) fields of entertainment. The list of nominees for Push Best New Artist were revealed on 23th July, On the other hand, the nominees for other categories were revealed on the 30th of July. The voting process for all categories was held on twitter and through MTV’s Instagram stories and it lasted till 23rd August. Subsequently, nominees for Song of Summer, Best Group, and Everyday Heroes: Frontline Medical Workers were added to the queue on 24th of August to shine light on the performances of Covid-19 responders. This time the award show received 6.4 million views which was a 5% decrease from the previous show which had around 6.8 million viewers. Most importantly, this year’s MTV video music awards were dedicated to Chadwick Boseman, an outstanding actor, who passed away due to colon cancer just two days before the show.

The event featured alluring performances such as Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande’s show stopping TV debut of their collaboration ‘Rain on Me’.” BTS, Miley Cyrus, the Black Eyed Peas, and more also took the stage, while A-listers like Drew Barrymore and Kelly Clarkson were present.

This award show was supposed to be organized in Barclays Centre for the first time since 2013.However, unfortunately due to the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic, it was decided that the event will be held without the presence of an audience this time. After consultation with the state and local health officers, MTV came to a conclusion that this show will be held in an outdoor platform across the city.

To make the MTV VMA award show an alluring one, the artists have worked exceptionally hard so that the show satisfies the expectation of the audience. In order to make this event more realistic, the majority of the performances were pre recorded in the New York City in various locations such as Hudson Yards, Brooklyn, In fact, Chroma key set was used to portray New York City scenarios for the performances of the artists who were unable to travel to New York. All personnel were asked to quarantine for three to four days on arrival to New York City and were tested for COVID before and after recording their respective performances. To add to that, during these shootings, the Red Carpet appearances followed by the acceptance speeches were also recorded.

To highlight the situation of ongoing pandemic, on July 30th, some new awards were added to the existing list of categories such as “Quarantine Performances” and “Best Music Video from Home” which went to Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber’s “Stuck with U” and CNCO’s “Unplugged at Home,” respectively. Besides being telecasted on the ViacomCBS family of networks, the VMAs were also aired on terrestrial television by THE CW.

Now, let’s take a look at the awards won by artists this season. ‘The Weeknd’ won the Video of the Year award for Blinding Lights. Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande were awarded Best Cinematography Awards for ‘Rain on me’. This was just a glimpse of some significant awards achieved by music artists this year.

Overall, MTV was able to make this year’s VMAs unique and exhilarating for the audiences although the event was held virtually. This was possible due to the invaluable efforts of MTV and cooperation of the artists.

Written By: Aniqa Nawar

Edited By: Ahona Karim