Tina Fey Disses Drake On-Stage at 2025 Emmy Awards: ‘I’m Gonna Hear It’

Tina Fey couldn’t help but crack a joke about Drake when presenting an award in which Kendrick Lamar was a nominee.

As the comedian listed the nominees for Outstanding Live Variety special during the 77th annual Emmy Awards on Sunday, September 14, she name-dropped the “Best I Ever Had” rapper after announcing Lamar’s nomination. The actress explained she was in an “awkward position” due to her close relationships with the nominees in the category.

“If Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime special wins...” she began before pausing and shaking her head. “I’m really going to hear it from Drake.”

“And Drake and I are suppose to play pickleball tomorrow...” Fey continued. “So … anyway.”

Lamar and Drake are known to be in one of the storied rap beefs in history. Although the pair started off as collaborators, Lamar took shots at Drake with a verse on Big Sean’s 2013 song “Control.”

“I didn’t really have anything to say about it,” the Toronto rapper addressed the feud in an interview with Billboard. “It just sounded like an ambitious thought to me. That’s all it was. I know good and well that Kendrick’s not murdering me, at all, in any platform. So when that day presents itself, I guess we can revisit the topic.”

Their fued continued back and forth for over a decade, with Lamar more recently releasing a series of diss tracks, including “Not Like Us.” In the lyrics, the California rapper accused Drake of sexual misconduct and cultural appropriation.

“We plotted for a week and then we fed you the information / A daughter that’s 11 years old, I bet he takes it / We thought about giving a fake name or a destination / But you so thirsty, you not concerned with investigation,” he raps.

The song was both commercially and critically successful, winning an award at the 67th Grammy Awards. The single was also notably included in Lamar's Emmy-nominated Super Bowl performance.

Their feud has only gotten messier as the “Best I Ever Had” singer went on to file numerous legal complaints, including accusations against Lamar’s record label, Universal Music Group (which is also his own record label), for conspiring to “artificially inflate” the popularity of “Not Like Us.”

Universal later denied Drake’s claim in a statement, obtained by Billboard. “The suggestion that UMG would do anything to undermine any of its artists is offensive and untrue. We employ the highest ethical practices in our marketing and promotional campaigns. No amount of contrived and absurd legal arguments in this pre-action submission can mask the fact that fans choose the music they want to hear," the message reads.