|
Emmy's shuns 'Lost' and 'Housewives' |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Written by asap
|
|
Thursday, 06 July 2006 |
|
|
|
|
|
Page 2 of 4
EXPECT TO SEE NEW FACES EARNING EMMY NOMINATIONS
By Aaron Barnhart
McClatchy Newspapers
All you need to know about the sameness of the Emmy Awards is this: From 2001 to 2005, there were 25 nominations for best female supporting actress in a comedy series. Three women claimed half of them, with Doris Roberts and Megan Mullaly making the ballot all five years.
Not even Meryl Streep made the Oscar short list five years in a row, probably because she had to keep finding new roles to play. But this is the Emmys, where one actor playing one part can park on the ballot for years at a time.
That’s because the 12,000 members of the industry group that hands out the awards has been shackled to an archaic nomination system. Devised during the three-network era, it has favored big broadcasters and a handful of cable channels, notably HBO, that are willing to shell out for large voter-influencing campaigns.
But all that appears ready to change.
When the Emmy nominations are announced Thursday morning, expect to hear some names that haven’t been within shouting distance of television’s highest honor. Names like Lauren Graham, who plays the feisty single mom on WB’s “Gilmore Girls,” Kristen Bell, the crime-solving teen namesake of UPN’s “Veronica Mars,” Denis Leary of FX’s “Rescue Me” and Treat Williams from the now-canceled WB drama “Everwood.” They’re all reportedly in the running for the first time.
What happened?
The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences is trying to transform the voting contest from one tilted toward old favorites and popular choices into one that has undergone what awards supervisor John Leverence calls a “quantitative and qualitative freshening of the pool.”
That’s a welcome change, because quantitatively and qualitatively, television has outgrown its grandest honor. You are just as likely to find outstanding original TV shows on cable as on broadcast, on a small network as on a large one.
And the people running the academy know it. Leverence told the New York Times that the Emmys have suffered from “a same-old, same-old situation,” with disinterested members turning out “a 60 percent to 80 percent repetition of the prior year’s nominees.”
Look, for instance, at the nominees for actress in a comedy series. Just eight women, out of a possible 25, have been contenders over the last five years.
If you follow TV at all, you know that Debra Messing of “Will & Grace” (a nominee from 2000 to 2003) did not have a better year than “Gilmore Girls” star Lauren Graham four years in a row.
Nor, in the best drama actor category, was Martin Sheen automatic all those years on “The West Wing,” though the nominations were. And you know that “Battlestar Galactica” is overlooked, except in technical categories, not because it’s not worthy, but because it’s on the SciFi channel.
The two key adjustments the academy made this year:
A new step whereby a peer group chooses a longer “finalists’ list” of 10 to 15 potential nominees.
A new screening round wherein a specially chosen panel rates one episode from each of the finalists’ shows, with the top five finishers getting on the ballot.
The finalists were determined late last month, and a list posted to the Internet by Tom O’Neil, the country’s foremost authority on TV award shows, is loaded with new faces.
O’Neil, who runs the GoldDerby.com Web site, published a list of finalists last week based on partly confirmed reports he collected from Emmy voters. Depending on the category, 10 or 15 finalists are competing for five nominations.
In addition to Graham, Leary, Bell and Williams — who would be fine additions to an Emmy ballot any year — O’Neil believes Matthew Fox is in the running for a best actor nomination for ABC’s “Lost,” as are Kyra Sedgwick for TNT’s “The Closer,” Fred Goss for the short-lived ABC sitcom “Sons & Daughters,” Steve Carell for NBC’s “The Office” and the three women who play Bill Paxton’s wives on HBO’s “Big Love” (and Paxton, too).
The academy has been unusually secretive about how the revamped procedure is going. But don’t be surprised if in 2007 we start seeing lists not just of nominees, but the finalists in each category before the Emmy nominations. That, of course, would raise the anticipation for the Emmys even higher than this year.
|
|
|  | "Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only truth." | |
|  | We're not that bright, even though in our own little world, we're geniuses. We like 80s hair bands and one-hit wonders, but among us we have respectable tastes, too. Metallica, Iron Maiden, U2. Pursuit of all things trivial is a lifestyle, not just a game. We like some sports, love other sports, and can find something to say about anything. We watch TV and movies and we've read a book or two, even a few classics (Yes, Classic Comics count!)
We call it insight, you call it what you will. | |
|  | Felix Wong is an outdoor enthusiast living in Fort Collins. A mechanical engineer by day, he is especially passionate about bicycling, running, and backpacking. | |
|  | Hola Amigos! I'm Sandra. I like to believe that people are 70 percent good and 30 percent dumb. I'm stickin to that story. Reading this blog might make you want to be good, but probably just dumb. | |
|  | Donovan Henderson is editor of NEXTnc. | |
|  | Here at Nextnc we have some characters. Get a sneak peak behind the curtain and find out what amusing antics our staffers get themselves into on a weekly basis. | |
|  | What is up FoCo?
I am a recent college graduate of Minnesota State University Moorhead. After recieving my B.A. in English and Mass Communications this past August I moved down to Colorado.
I enjoy long walks on the beach, candlelight dinners, and heavy metal. My hobbies include reading and writing, music, movies, and getting drunk. Some of my favorite contemporary authors include Bret Easton Ellis, Chuck Palahniuk, and Kurt Vonnegut. My top movies are anything directed by Kubrick. I enjoy listening to anything that rocks.
Right now I am just trying to get to know Colorado and FoCo better. Mostly in order to find the best drink specials on each day that ends in Y. So if you know where I can get a cheap drunk on, let me know!
--Drew | |
|  | Life's little morsels of inspiration, observation and encouragement seen through the eyes of the Nextnc reporter.
| |
|  | Ms. Giles currently lives in Colorado where she stars in her own private reality show. She writes aphoristic accounts of her life, taken completely out of context, and embellished with characters and situations disguised to resemble something close to interesting. | |
|  | over and out | |
| | My name is Michelle Turley and I'm 28 years old. I live in Severance with my hubbie, Brandon. We have 2 dogs and a cat. We enjoy camping, four-wheeling, and just being in the mountains. I like to cook, clean (go figure), flea market, and play poker. I have so much to say about poker... | |
|
|
|
|
| |
