The Hollywood Reporter Awards Special 22B, June 14, 2021

Friendships have been captured on television for years, but two recent British limited series — Russell T. Davies’ It’s a Sin and Michaela Coel’s I May Destroy You — portray the intimacy and adventure of these relationships with the same levels of fascination as their more romantic counterparts. They succeed at it by forgoing grand gestures for quieter moments, observing the particularities of a relationship with nuance and specificity before exploring how they shift, morph or potentially collapse in the face of trauma. Friendships rely on a common language — a phrase, a gesture or a facial expression. Should a member of the group stray too far, get lost or become subsumed by isolation, that expression can pull them back into the fold. For the crew on HBO Max’s It’s a…

ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES OR TV MOVIE MICHAELA COEL I May Destroy You The 33-year-old Brit is the only actress listed here who also created, wrote, co-directed and executive produced her own show — which was, according to Metacritic, 2020’s best and is at 98 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, the highest-rated of any represented on this list. Her portrayal of a young creative who, like herself, struggles in the aftermath of a sexual assault, brought her a SAG Award nom and BAFTA TV Award win. Its Achilles’ heel: It is one of several HBO contenders and began rolling out a full year ago, longer ago than any of these other actresses’ shows. NICOLE KIDMAN The Undoing The veteran of the field, 53, won this award four years ago for…

“With my schedule, I rarely get to see things before the hype surrounds certain projects. I’m always the last to see things. For some reason — well, not ‘for some reason’; it’s because of the global pandemic — I remember being home right when The Queen’s Gambit loaded onto Netflix. I was immediately taken by the general aesthetic of the show and how intentional and striking Anya Taylor-Joy was as the character. I spent the whole day watching [all seven episodes] — I couldn’t stop. I thought it was one of the best things I’ve ever watched. And no one was talking about it yet! I felt immediately cool, like such a hipster. The intentionality of it all was so clear to me, and even the evolution of Beth’s aesthetic…

STEPHEN KING OCT. 28 “I’ve watched a lot of TV during this cursed year — I know I’m not alone — and the best of the best is THE QUEEN’S GAMBIT, on Netflix. Utterly thrilling.” HALSEY NOV. 7 “in unrelated news I binge watched The Queen’s Gambit to keep myself sane the past few days. Can’t tell who I have a bigger crush on. Anya Taylor-Joy or Thomas Brodie-Sangster!!!!” KAREN GILLAN NOV. 4 “The Queens Gambit was so good, and I don’t want it to be over make more MAKE MORE PLEASE” KERRY WASHINGTON NOV. 14 “I loved #QueensGambit. Loved. Wept at the end. Beautiful storytelling. Bravo to the creators, cast and crew. And especially Moses Ingram We see you. You blessed this production!” JOSH GAD NOV. 29 “Can we…

For many people, 2020 was the worst year of their lives, but for Sarah Cooper, it was — at least in a professional sense — the best. During the global pandemic, her DIY videos, shot at home in Brooklyn and featuring her lip-syncing and acting out then-President Donald Trump, went viral. The Washington Post described her as “just about the only good thing in a year mired in isolation, racial unrest and political conflict.” Adweek named her Digital Creator of the Year. And in October, Cooper was given the larger platform that she deserves: a Netflix comedy special called Sarah Cooper: Everything’s Fine. The 44-year-old recently spoke with THR’s Awards Chatter podcast about her life and career. Where were you born and raised? And what did your folks do for…

Director Susanne Bier vividly remembers her first meeting with Nicole Kidman to discuss collaborating on The Undoing, the pair’s nail-biter of an HBO limited series. The director walked into the Sunset Marquis to find the star seated beneath a giant black-and-white portrait of herself. “It was almost mythical,” says Bier, who needed little convincing to sign on to the project. Kidman, for her part, was completely unaware of the placement. “I didn’t see it!” she insists. “I just remember that we clicked and that she really wanted the show to be a thriller, not a character study, and that was exciting to me.” The two went on to bring David E. Kelley’s scripts to life in the compelling, six-episode limited series, which became the network’s most watched show of 2020.…