Morning Show host Larry Emdur recalled being “the most fired man on television” after winning the Gold Logie at the Logie Awards on Sunday night.

“I’ve never done anything else and never wanted to do anything else,” Emdur said after winning his first Logie in a 40-year career that has seen him host everything from The Price Is Right to Celebrity Dog School.

He vowed to keep his promise and “get the initials of all the nominees tattooed on his butt live tomorrow morning” after defeating Tony Armstrong, Julia Morris, Robert Irwin, Asher Keddie, Andy Lee and Sonia Kruger in the battle for the evening’s top prize.

“So I’ll see you tomorrow on the morning show,” he said.

US streaming giant Netflix and its hit miniseries Boy Swallows Universe also dominated Australian television’s biggest night, with 15-year-old star Felix Cameron fighting back tears after winning Best Actor in a Drama and Most Popular Young Actor for his breakout role as Eli Bell.

“The last award I won before tonight was Student of the Week in Year 5,” Cameron said at the ceremony in Sydney. “That’s a pretty big deal.”

Trent Dalton, who drew on his own family and childhood when writing the best-selling novel that inspired the series, accepted the award for Best Miniseries or TV Movie and paid tribute to “all the mothers who are a little bit like Frankie Bell.”

“You’re out there in the suburbs tonight, feeling a little lost in the darkness,” he said. “Please believe me when I tell you that when your children look at you in the dark, they only see your light.”

In his second year as awards host, comedian Sam Pang’s opening monologue poked fun at Australia’s free-to-air broadcasters, including Logies broadcaster Seven.

“I stand before you safe in the knowledge that this network will defend me in court, whatever I say,” Pang said, alluding to the network’s connection to several high-profile court cases.

“And given their impeccable record in defamation cases over the past few years, I think I will have no problems,” Pang added. “To put it bluntly, I am not being paid by Channel Seven tonight. Instead, they are paying my rent.”

Later that evening, “60 Minutes” host Tom Steinfort also referenced the network when he accepted the award for best reporting or public affairs report for his show’s investigation, “Ben Roberts-Smith: The Truth.”

“We definitely did not expect this given Ben Roberts-Smith’s employment history,” said Steinfort. The soldier resigned from Seven West Media last year, a day after a judge found he had murdered unarmed civilians while serving in the military in Afghanistan.

Seven scored a win of its own when its coverage of Matilda’s spectacular races at the FIFA Women’s World Cup became the first standalone women’s sporting event to win the Logie for Best Sports Coverage. The network’s flight doctor drama RFDS also won Best Drama.

Also on the same evening, Rebecca Gibney, star of “The Flying Doctors” and “Packed to the Rafters,” became the fourth woman to be inducted into the Logies Hall of Fame.

“If someone had told me, as a 16-year-old suffering from crippling anxiety and severe body dysmorphia, that one day I would be standing on stage with this award, they wouldn’t have believed it,” Gibney said.

The long-running ABC satire “Utopia” also took home three awards: Rob Sitch and Kitty Flanagan were named Best Actor and Best Actress in a Comedy, while the series won the award for Best Screenplay in a Comedy.

Towards the end of the nearly five-hour show, Celia Pacquola, star of “Utopia” and “Thank God You’re Here,” provided a memorable moment when, while presenting the best drama program, she apparently read the wrong category title from the teleprompter and shouted: “Someone at Channel Seven has been kidding me!”

Pacquola’s off-the-cuff remark was only surpassed by Emdur’s victory speech, in which he joked that his own children had not watched free-to-air television in 15 years and said: “It’s a nice recognition; recognition for me usually means when someone on the street says to me, ‘Calm down, you motherfucker!'”