Even though he wasn't at Sunday night's 61st Annual Primetime Emmy Awards, Kanye West still loomed large over the event. While critically acclaimed TV shows like "30 Rock" and "Mad Men" were scooping up repeat wins, jokes about West's stage-busting outburst at the previous week's VMAs were par for the course.

Among the surprise winners were Australian actress Toni Collette, who beat out "30 Rock" star Tina Fey for Best Actress in a Comedy Series for her role as a woman with multiple personalities in Showtime's "United States of Tara" (written by "Juno" and "Jennifer's Body" scribe Diablo Cody). Collette was almost upstaged, however, by fellow nominee Sarah Silverman, who grabbed the spotlight by sporting a fake mustache during the reading of the nominees and breaking awards-show etiquette by pretending to be put out when she didn't make the cut.

"30 Rock" nabbed the Best Comedy Series award for the third year in a row, beating out such buzzed-about contenders as "Flight of the Conchords," "Weeds," host Neil Patrick Harris' "How I Met Your Mother" and the first animated series to get the nod in nearly 50 years, "Family Guy." Fey's co-star, Alec Baldwin, also took home Best Actor in a Comedy Series for his role as network boss Jack Donaghy. "I'd trade this to look like him," Baldwin joked of presenter Rob Lowe.

Justin Timberlake showed up to collect his previously awarded Best Guest Actor in a Comedy Series Emmy for his guest-stint on "Saturday Night Live." This was the first time "SNL" hosts have been eligible for that award. He took home the prize for, among other memorable moments, his unforgettable ode to cougars, "Motherlover." He, of course, also dropped a Kanye reference while picking up the trophy, telling fellow Guest Actor in a Comedy Series winner Tina Fey, "Imma let you finish."

"Samantha Who" star Christina Applegate joked on the preshow, "I just have to wonder: Who's gonna pull a Kanye?" She was followed a few minutes later by a similar joke from "Survivor" host Jeff Probst.

Speaking of repeats, the 1960s advertising drama "Mad Men" snagged the Best Drama Series award for a second year in a row, though its cast was shut out in the acting categories and it won in just three of the 16 categories for which it was nominated. Another repeat winner was Glenn Close, who took home Best Actress in a Drama for her take on a tough lawyer in the FX drama "Damages," a role Close called "the character of my lifetime."

Former "Malcolm in the Middle" dad Bryan Cranston also made it a twofer, winning Best Actor in a Drama Series for "Breaking Bad," in which he plays a terminally ill chemistry teacher-turned-crystal-meth-cooker. Another repeat winner was "Amazing Race," which beat the competition in the Reality Competition Program for the seventh straight year. "The Daily Show" also made it seven straight with a win for Outstanding Variety Series.

Michael Emerson, who plays the creepy, not-to-be-trusted Benjamin Linus on "Lost," won for a second time in the Best Supporting Actor in a Drama category, eight years after first taking the award for his guest work on "The Practice."

There were a few fresh faces on the stage, though, including Kristin Chenoweth — who, like host Harris, will be a guest judge on the upcoming season of "American Idol" — who won Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for the canceled "Pushing Daisies." Chenoweth, who was later taken to the hospital for a migraine-related incident, joked during her acceptance speech, "I'm unemployed now, so I'd like to be on 'Mad Men.' I also like 'The Office' and '24.' " Another first-timer was actress Cherry Jones, who won Best Supporting Actress in a Drama for her role as the president on "24."

The show opened with Harris doing a song and dance number called "Put Down the Remote," in which he pleaded with viewers to stick with the show after last year's Emmys brought the lowest ratings in history thanks to an ill-informed decision to have a rotating group of reality-show stars host the program. Harris not only proved his "Dr. Horrible" singing chops were still strong, he also kept the evening moving with a series of crisp jokes and comically uncomfortable exchange with his competition in the Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series, Jon Cryer.

After Cryer won his first trophy in four tries for his work in the popular "Two and a Half Men," Harris dialed him up on the big screen while Cryer was talking to the press backstage and needled him about the win, making him double-check the envelope to make sure it really had his name in it. "I used to think that awards were just shallow tokens of momentary popularity," Cryer joked during his acceptance speech. "But now — [I realize] they are the only true measure of a person's real worth as a human being."

Viewers voted online for the Breakthrough Moment of the Year, which was awarded to a scene from HBO's vampire and shape-shifters drama, "True Blood."

The night's biggest winner was the public television mini-series "Little Dorritt," an adaptation of a Charles Dickens serial novel that aired on PBS and won seven Emmys over the course of the night, including Best Miniseries. Other winners included "Wizards of Waverly Place" for Best Children's Program; the Harris-starring "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog" for Best Short-Format Live-Action Entertainment Program; MTV's 2008 Video Music Awards for Best Art Direction for a Variety, Music or Nonfiction Programming; "South Park" for Best Animated Program and Bruce Gowers of "American Idol" for Best Directing for a Variety, Music or Comedy Series.

Even when the winners weren't household names, such as veteran actor Ken Howard, who won for Best Supporting Actor in a Miniseries for his work in the HBO drama "Grey Gardens," their speeches touched on universal themes. "This is very encouraging," first-time nominee Howard said, praying that he wouldn't be "interrupted by congressmen or rappers."

The incomparable Dan Castellaneta won Outstanding Voice-Over Performance for his many characters on "The Simpsons," including Homer Simpson and Krusty the Clown, beating out fellow cast members Hank Azaria and Harry Shearer, as well as "Family Guy" boss Seth MacFarlane and voice of "Robot Chicken," Seth Green.