“Succession,” HBO’s operatic saga about a media dynasty and a two-time best drama winner, earned 27 Emmy nominations for its farewell season Wednesday morning, the biggest haul of any series.
That tally helped propel HBO and its companion streaming service, Max, to one of its strongest years yet, with 127 nominations, the most of any network. Netflix finished in second place with 103.
HBO dominated the best drama category, with nods not only for “Succession” but for the second season of “The White Lotus” as well as for “The Last of Us,” its popular video game adaptation , and “House of the Dragon,” its “Game of Thrones” prequel. It’s the first time since 1992 that a network has earned four nominations in the category.
“Ted Lasso,” the Apple TV+ awards favorite, earned 21 nominations, the most of any comedy, for its third season, which is believed to be its last. The race for best comedy is shaping up to be a showdown between “Ted Lasso,” “The Bear,” an FX show on Hulu, and ABC’s “Abbott Elementary,” which would be the first network show to win the category in for nine years.
While Emmy nominations day is usually a fun affair for the television industry to toast the best in the business, the timing of the announcement this year was downright awkward.
More than 11,000 television and feature film writers went on strike for 72 days. The union representing 160,000 actors has been negotiating with major Hollywood studios for more than a month — with its contract set to expire next Wednesday, just hours after the nominations are announced. Organizers have privately decided that if the strike — or, worse, a pair of strikes — continues for another two or three weeks, they will have to postpone the September ceremony, likely for months.
Frank Scherma, the chairman of the Television Academy, which organizes the Emmys, cited labor disputes before the nominations were presented. “We hope that the guild’s negotiations will reach an equitable and speedy resolution,” he said. In his sign off, he noted that the ceremony is “currently planned” for Monday, September 18.
While Netflix is a bit short of top contenders in the drama and comedy categories, the streaming giant can count on two top favorites in the limited series category at the Emmys: Ryan Murphy’s “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story,” which scored 13 nominations overall, and “Beef,” which was a hit for the streamer.
“The Crown,” Netflix’s lavish chronicle of the British royal family, and the best drama winner at the 2021 Emmys, is also nominated in the category this year — though some critics have had trouble warming up to fifth season of the show, which featured a new cast.
The moment of victory for HBO comes at a time of transition for the network, which since last year has been run by a debt-ridden parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery. The network is now part of a streaming service that has shed its call letters (bye HBO Max, hello Max). And, for the first time, HBO is in the process of licensing venerable older series — “Insecure,” and soon “Six Feet Under,” “Band of Brothers” and “True Blood” — to its archrival, Netflix, in an attempt by Warner Bros. Discovery to drum up money.
HBO has the three most nominated shows: “Succession” (27), “The Last of Us” (24) and “The White Lotus” (23). The race for best actor in a drama is shaping up to be another “Succession” Roy family competition, pitting one-time winner Jeremy Strong against two-time nominee Kieran Culkin and the four-time nominated (and one-time winner, for a 2000 mini-series) Brian Cox. And HBO completely swept the best supporting actor in a drama category: eight out of eight, all split between performers from “Succession” and “The White Lotus.”
Of course, the last time a network earned four nominations in the best drama category, 31 years ago, it went home empty-handed. In 1992, when NBC earned nominations for “I’ll Fly Away,” “LA Law,” “Law & Order” and “Quantum Leap.” All four series lost to that year’s winner, “Northern Exposure,” from CBS.
This year’s best actor in the comedy category will go with Jason Sudeikis, who won two years in a row for playing the title role in “Ted Lasso,” against Jeremy Allen White, who plays an ambitious and eager chef in “The Bear.” Other nominees in the category are Bill Hader for “Barry,” Jason Segel for “Shrinking” and Martin Short for “Only Murders in the Building.”
Award prognosticators believe Quinta Brunson may be on a glide path to win for “Abbott Elementary.” Brunson took home writing honors at last year’s Emmys for her kind-hearted workplace comedy on ABC, and would become the first Black woman to win best actress in a comedy since Isabel Sanford won in 1981 for “The Jeffersons.” He will face Christina Applegate from “Dead to Me,” Rachel Brosnahan for “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” Natasha Lyonne for “Poker Face” and Jenna Ortega for “Wednesday.”
This year the Emmys will crown a new king of the night. John Oliver, whose HBO show, “Last Week Tonight,” has been named best variety talk show seven years in a row, has been moved into a new Emmy category this year — outstanding scripted variety series.
That gives hosts like Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel or Seth Meyers the inside track to win for best talk series for their current night shows for the first time. (Colbert’s old Comedy Central series, “The Colbert Report,” won best variety series twice, in 2013 and 2014.) Trevor Noah, who recently left “The Daily Show,” received a nomination for his final months in the chair, and Noah’s successor, Jon Stewart, a former runaway winner at the Emmys, was nominated for his Apple TV+ series, “The Problem With Jon Stewart.” (Jimmy Fallon’s “The Tonight Show” hasn’t been nominated in the category since 2016.)
In the scripted variety series category, Oliver will now compete against “Saturday Night Live,” the show that has won more Emmys than any other series. “SNL” represents stiff competition, but there are signs of weakness for the NBC stalwart. After a very strong Emmy run during the Trump years, “SNL” has earned just nine Emmy nominations for each of the past two years. That was its lowest tally since 2015. Also nominated was “A Black Lady Sketch Show,” which HBO recently canceled.
There were several performers who got multiple nominations. Pedro Pascal, star of “The Last of Us,” was nominated for best actor in a drama, as well as best guest actor in a comedy (for his hosting roles on “Saturday Night Live” ) and for best narrator (for CNN’s “Patagonia: Life at the Edge of the World”). Those are Pascal’s first Emmy nominations.
Other notable multiple awards include Melanie Lynskey, nominated for best actress in a drama series (“Yellowjackets”) and best guest actress in a drama (“The Last of Us”). Murray Bartlett, last year’s best supporting actor in a limited series for “The White Lotus,” is also nominated twice: for best guest actor in a drama series for “The Last Of Us” ( Nick Offerman, who played Bartlett’s romantic partner, was also nominated) and best supporting actor in a limited series for “Welcome to Chippendales.”