The backstage reviews for the Emmy telecast were not kind. To the Emmy hosts.

Entourage star Jeremy Piven ripped their opening. The writer for John Adams ripped their general presence.

Jeff Probst, one of the five reality-bound Emmy cohosts, took the harsh Tribal Council vote well.

"We knew all along it's going to be tough having five people," Probst told the Emmy backstage press.

The problem, Probst says, was getting those five people—Probst, Project Runway's Heidi Klum, American Idol's Ryan Seacrest, Dancing With the Stars' Tom Bergeron and Deal or No Deal's Howie Mandel—to agree on what they were going to do on the Nokia Theatre stage.

"That's why we ended up with nothing [for the opening]. Did it work? I don't know. I'll have to watch it. Piven didn't like it," Probst said. "Maybe he was right."

In any case, all ended well for Probst. The Survivor host took the first-ever Emmy awarded to a reality-show host.

"It feels great to be in the family," Probst said.

Even a family that squabbles.