Russell Brand had one mission while hosting last night’s MTV Movie Awards: finding his “next wife.”
“The last MTV awards show I hosted I ended up marrying someone who was there,” the British comedian joked in his opening monologue, referring to his estranged wife Katy Perry, who was not present for the show. “I will be keeping my eyes peeled tonight for my next wife,” Brand continued.
RUSSELL BRAND ON HIS KISS WITH ALEC BALDWIN
RUSSELL BRAND: ‘I STILL LOVE KATY PERRY
Brand and Perry met in an unusual way at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2009. Perry has said that their romance began when “I threw an empty water bottle at his head across Radio City Music Hall.” While the pair married in India in 2010, Brand filed for divorce from Perry on Dec. 30 after just 14 months of marriage.
“If after recent events you think it’s hypocritical of me to make joke about a celebrity beating up paparazzi, wait until you hear my jokes about short-lived celebrity marriages,” said Brand, continuing his monologue with a dig on Justin Bieber over his recent skirmish with a paparazzi photographer. “Kim Kardashian took a load of pressure off me with her world record quick marriage. Cheers Kim!”
In addition to lines on Michael Fassbender and John Travolta, Brand also spent time joking with Charlie Sheen, who ate up the attention and stood up for a round of applause.
“I need someone in this audience more unstable and reckless than me to do something crazy if I say something stupid and jeopardize my green card,” explained Brand. “That someone is obviously Charlie Sheen. Charlie, you do look well and relatively sober, so what I’ve done is taped a bottle of Hennessy and gram of coke under your chair in case I start going crazy.”
During the awards show, “The Hunger Games” and “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1” jockeyed for the top awards. Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson of “The Hunger Games” won Best Female Performance and Best Male performance, respectively. However, the film failed to unseat ” Breaking Dawn Part I” which won Movie of the Year.
But while the show favored young adult fare, several of Hollywood’s 40-somethings also received honors. Jennifer Aniston shimmied on stage in a short leather dress to collect the award for Best On-Screen Dirtbag for playing a nymphomaniac dentist in “Horrible Bosses.” Meanwhile Johnny Depp, who played guitar during a performance with the Black Keys, was gifted with the award show’s Generation Award.