Neil Patrick Harris pulled off successful Emmys, despite 'embarrassing' dance routine It might have been sombre, and featured a dance number that one high-profile actress tweeted was "just embarrassing," but the Emmys Awards scored its largest American audience in eight years. Preliminary ratings figures indicate the three-hour telecast on television network CBS averaged 17.6 million viewers, compared to 13.3 million viewers for last year, its biggest numbers since Ellen DeGeneres hosted the award's night in 2005. Not necessarily a crowd-pleaser ... (from left) Nathan Fillion, Neil Patrick Harris and Sarah Silverman perform a musical number at the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards. But only about 11 million seem to have stuck around after the surprise upsets to see Breaking Bad win for drama series and Modern Family scoop up its fourth consecutive win for comedy. This compares to the 40 million people who watched this year's Academy Awards, the 28 million people who tuned in to the Grammys and the 20 million who checked out the Golden Globes. Far more, it must be said, than the 1.463 million people who tuned in to Australia's television El Dorado, the telecast of the 55th annual TV Week Logie Awards in which Asher Keddie won the Gold Logie. Host Neil Patrick Harris bettered last year's host Jimmy Kimmel, who scored around 13.3 million viewers. It added punch to an on-stage gag in which Kimmel quipped to Harris: "There's a good chance they won't ask you back next year." Harris, himself might have already ruled himself out, tweeting: "Emceeing the Emmys was fun but I'm sure glad it's over. Looking forward to not hosting anything for a long time. He added the ratings success had made his bosses "very happy." One who was disappointed by the show was Grey's Anatomy actress, Ellen Pompeo. She was quoted by Associated Press as saying: "I didn't see any diversity in the Emmys at all. The Emmys felt so dated to me. That dance number was embarrassing. Did you see one person of colour in that dance number?