Dakota Johnson presented the inaugural trophy, and Swift used the moment to reveal she has written or directed eighteen of her own sixty music videos.
MTV built a whole new trophy just for her. Taylor Swift became the first-ever recipient of the VMAs' Artist Director Honor on Sunday night in Los Angeles, a category the network invented, according to The Hollywood Reporter, seemingly with her in mind.
Dakota Johnson did the honours on stage. "Taylor Swift is a storyteller," Johnson told the room. "She is an architect of emotional landscapes filled with the most intimate and intricate details." Before Swift walked up, a video package ran through her directing history, and Johnson reminded everyone of the obvious: nobody has more VMAs than her.
Swift didn't rush through the acceptance. She thanked MTV for backing music videos as a format going back decades, thanked her fans, and then dropped the number that's going to get repeated all week — sixty music videos to her name, eighteen of them written or directed by Swift herself. On her way up, she stopped to hug Ella Bright from Off Campus, which is the kind of small detail these shows are made of.
Then came the actual premiere. Swift introduced the video for her new single "Patient Zero," which stars Johnson alongside Colin Farrell, the first time audiences saw it play out in full.
The ceremony itself ran into some scheduling chaos before it even started. CBS was mid-Ravens-Cowboys broadcast, which pushed the televised VMAs back roughly twenty minutes. The show still kicked off on time for the crowd inside the venue, meaning the in-person audience watched Madonna open the night a full twenty minutes before anyone at home did.
That Madonna opener was its own event. Her first VMA performance in 23 years, with Sabrina Carpenter and Charli XCX joining her on stage and cameos from Sombr and Seth Rogen. It also marked the VMAs' return to Los Angeles for the first time since Katy Perry hosted at The Forum back in 2017.
Snoop Dogg hosted the whole thing, with a lineup that also included Lisa, Sienna Spiro, GENER8ION, Kacey Musgraves, Teddy Swims, Sombr again, and Gunna and Yung Lean. Nirvana's surviving members picked up the video vanguard award, and the broadcast carved out space for tributes to Dolly Parton and George Michael.
For Swift, the Artist Director Honor adds a new shelf to a trophy case that was already the fullest in VMA history. Whether MTV keeps handing this one out every year, or whether it was built specifically to mark this moment, is the question nobody's answered yet.
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