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The evening's other big news was Beyonce revealing she was pregnant with her and Jay-Z's first child before shaking up that fetus, inroducing "Love on Top" by saying, "I want you to feel the love that's growing inside of me."

KATY PERRY, ADELE DOMINATE; LADY GAGA GOES MALE AT VMAS

Adele Snags a Field-Leading Four, while Katy Grabs Three, Including Video of the Year
It was a night for female divas as Katy Perry took home top honors at last night's 2011 MTV Video Music Awards at the Nokia Theatre at L.A. Live.

Perry received three awards, including Video of the Year for "Firework," along with Best Collaboration and Best Special Effects for "E.T." with Kanye West. Perry had received a total of nine nominations to top the field.

"Now this is the time when you want to interrupt me, Kanye," she said while accepting the award with the rapper, who infamously stepped on Taylor Swift's acceptance speech a couple of years ago.

The evening's other big winner was Adele, who performed a show-stopping version of "Someone Like You," then grabbed four awards in the technical categories for "Rolling in the Deep," including Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, Best Direction and Best Editing.

Lady Gaga opened the show in character as Jo Calderone, a duck-tailed, foul-mouthed, T-shirt wearing dude resembling Jon Cryer's Duckie character in Pretty in Pink. He/she then performed "You and I" with Queen's Brian May ripping off one of the evening's rare guitar solos, then accepted the Best Female Video award for "Born This Way" on behalf of the "absent" Gaga.

Britney Spears received Best Pop Video for "Till the World Ends," then was presented the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award by Gaga, still in drag as Calderone, as the two threatened to liplock.

The evening's other big news was Beyonce revealing she was pregnant with her and Jay-Z's first child before shaking up that fetus, inroducing "Love on Top" by saying, "I want you to feel the love that's growing inside of me." She ended up winning Best Choreography for her video, "Run the World (Girls)."

Nicky Minaj won Best Hip-Hop Video for "Super Bass," while Justin Bieber's "U Smile" was named Best Male Video and Foo Fighters' "Walk" nabbed Best Rock Video, prompting Dave Grohl to dedicate the win to recently departed MTV head Judy McGrath. Tyler, the Creator of L.A.'s notorious Odd Future hip-hop collective, won Best New Artist in perhaps the evening's biggest surprise for his black comic video, "Yonkers," joined by his homies for a profanity-laced acceptance speech.

There were no real water cooler moments, but several performances stood out aside from Gaga, Adele and Beyonce, including Jay-Z and Kanye's bombastic "Otis," Pitbull and Ne-Yo's "Give Me Everything" and Lil Wayne's show-closing expletive deleted romp, which included a sample of "Iron Man."

Chris Brown flew through the air in a stunningly choreographed routine that evoked YouTube's "History of Dance," while in the evening's only rock performance, Young the Giant's Sameer Gadhia jumped into a mosh pit featuring 250 of the SoCal band's fans.

Russell Brand and Tony Bennett paid tribute to the late Amy Winehouse, the latter previewing a video of his duet with her on "Body & Soul," which will be featured on his upcoming Duets II album. Bruno Mars performed "Valerie," a hit Winehouse had with Mark Ronson of a song originally written by the Zutons and included on her producer's album Version.

Points also to Jessie J for masterfully performing the related segues into and out of the commercials even though she was forced to remain seated from a broken leg she suffered in June. It was good stateside exposure for the Lava/Universal Republic U.K. pop star. Ditto also for comic Kevin Hall's pre-taped backstage bits, which seemed to justify his complaint about not bering named host.

Here's the full list of awards:

Video of the Year: Katy Perry, "Firework"
Best Pop Video: Britney Spears, "Till the World Ends"
Best Rock Video: Foo Fighters, "Walk"
Best Hip-Hop Video: Nicki Minaj, "Super Bass"
Best Male Video: Justin Bieber, "U Smile"
Best Female Video: Lady Gaga, "Born This Way"
Best New Artist: Tyler, the Creator, "Yonkers"
Best Collaboration: Katy Perry featuring Kanye West, "E.T."
Best Art Direction: Adele, "Rolling in the Deep"
Best Choreography: Beyonce, "Run the World (Girls)"
Best Cinematography: Adele, "Rolling in the Deep"
Best Direction: Adele, "Rolling in the Deep"
Best Editing: Adele, "Rolling in the Deep"
Best Special Effects: Katy Perry featuring Kanye West, "E.T."