Innholdsfortegnelse for Awards Special 24B, August 19, 2024 i The Hollywood Reporter

Picture the scene. It’s November 2019, and I’m sitting in Buckingham Palace in England. I’m on an ornate golden chair, pushed up against the wall of the south drawing room, staring nervously at the slightly frayed but elegant red-and-gold carpeted floor. The room is larger than most London flats, and I’m just 15 feet behind the chair of the Queen’s “favorite son,” Prince Andrew. He’s seated with his back to me, his left foot tapping over and over on the palace floor. In my line of sight is renowned BBC Newsnight journalist Emily Maitlis, who is about to conduct the interview of her life about Prince Andrew’s friendship with prolific sex offender and trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and about the allegations of sexual assault made against him by Virginia Giuffre. It’s…

When Jon Bernthal filmed his first episode of The Bear, during the show’s first season, he did it on his lunch break. It was early 2022, and he was the lead of Showtime’s American Gigolo, a job that required him to be in Los Angeles — and on set — every day. But he got a call from his old friend Ebon Moss-Bachrach (Bernthal’s first professional gig was understudying for Moss-Bachrach in an off-Broadway play) about an enthralling opportunity. “Ebon was like, I’m doing this thing and it’s really special, and there’s a role that’s really important we want you to do,” he says. “He’s the kind of guy who isn’t talking about, ‘Oh it’s going to be a massive hit or commercially successful.’ He told me it’s an incredible…

Meredith Scardino, creator and showrunner of Girls5eva, is no stranger to the Emmy winner’s circle. She got her start in comedy writing in late night and spent six years writing for The Colbert Report, where she won four Emmy trophies. She also worked as a writer-producer on the Tina Fey and Robert Carlock series Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, which earned 18 Emmy nominations during its four-season run. With Girls5eva now on Netflix after being canceled by Peacock at the close of its second season, the musical comedy’s Emmy nomination for best writing feels all the more special. “Of course this has extra meaning, for the blood, sweat and tears that you put into it,” says Scardino. Sara Bareilles, who stars alongside Renée Elise Goldsberry, Paula Pell and Busy Philipps in the…

There’s day-one fans of The Bear, and then there’s Ramy Youssef, a longtime friend of Christopher Storer, the creator of the FX series who was also an executive producer of his Hulu comedy drama Ramy. “I’ve been a fan of The Bear since before we knew if it was going to get picked up,” he tells THR. “Chris sent me the pilot, and it kind of blew me away.” A longtime friend and collaborator of the creator of the FX series, Youssef has been nominated for an Emmy for outstanding directing after stepping behind the camera for season two’s “Honeydew” episode, which finds Marcus (Lionel Boyce, who is nominated for outstanding supporting actor) in Copenhagen, crafting unique pastries alongside Will Poulter’s staunch chef Luca. (Poulter also has been nominated for…

One would be hard-pressed to find a casting director who doesn’t revel in the joy of discovering brand-new talent. “It’s one of the most exciting parts of the job,” says Robert Sterne, casting director on The Crown, the series that over the course of six seasons has embraced both British national treasures like Imelda Staunton, Olivia Colman and Helena Bonham Carter, and turned lesser-known actors like Emma Corrin and Josh O’Connor into bona fide stars. “With something like The Crown, when you see somebody being given an amazing creative opportunity to really explore and develop their craft in a supportive environment that will then take them to the next stage, it is incredibly satisfying.” On The Morning Show, with Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon as headliners, Victoria Thomas’ challenge is…

Néstor Carbonell grew facial hair, gained 25 pounds, learned how to appropriately bow and, yes, even learned how to row a boat for the FX limited series Shogun, which scored a leading 25 Emmy nominations, including one for Carbonell as guest actor. Carbonell portrays Rodrigues, a Spanish pilot tasked with bringing Blackthorne (played by Cosmo Jarvis) to Lord Toranaga (Hiroyuki Sanada). The actor likens Rodrigues to Iago in Othello as “sort of a Machiavellian character, someone who knows how to play people. He knows the chess game.” Here, Carbonell walks THR through the preparation that led to his first Emmy nom. Congratulations on your first Emmy nomination. What does this recognition mean to you for this show in particular? That’s a great question because this character means so much to…

When Fellow Travelers creator Ron Nyswaner thinks back to filming the series, he chokes up. The tears begin to flow as the writer-producer recalls being on set and making history with a series starring four openly gay actors — playing gay characters — along with four proud LGBTQ executive producers working behind the scenes. “There was a mission to what we were doing on Fellow Travelers,” Nyswaner tells The Hollywood Reporter. “To do right by the people who suffered and who were persecuted, who lost their lives during the Lavender Scare, and do right by the people who died of AIDS and to honor them. It was sacred in a way. “[Jonathan Bailey] said it to the crew on his last night, when he wrapped. I get choked up,” Nyswaner…

Morgan Neville has a singular eye for capturing the complexities of the artistic spirit. Who better than the Oscar-winning documentarian to take on the Mount Everest of Hollywood geniuses: Steve Martin. The result, Apple’s STEVE! (martin) a Documentary in 2 Pieces, is an insightful film split down the middle in stylistically distinct chapters. Part one traces Martin’s path to “wild and crazy” comedy superstardom; part two covers his decision to step away from touring and into movies, playwriting, art and quiet self-exploration. Neville, Emmy-nominated for directing for a documentary/nonfiction program, spoke to THR about the daunting task of capturing someone as complex and worshiped as Martin in a little over three hours. “Best Fishes” [a gag poster where Martin had a fish sticking out of a his blazer] was the…

Not only did John Hawkes land his first Emmy nomination this year, he actually earned two: a supporting actor nom for playing the corrupt cop Hank Prior in True Detective: Night Country and another for his song “No Use,” which he composed and performed in character on the HBO anthology series. After Hawkes was cast, showrunner Issa López suggested that Hank might play music. At first, the actor “wasn’t sure that was a great idea,” but then realized he’s always been fascinated by people who do something out of character. “I began to wrap my head around it a little more, and Issa asked if I could write an instrumental score piece.” A “good-natured argument” ensued about whether the song should have lyrics. “I just thought, ‘Well, that’s too performative,…

For a global animation space where Japanese anime dominates, Blue Eye Samurai creators Michael Green and Amber Noizumi looked to stand out from the crowd early on with their Netflix series about a female swordmaster on a bloody revenge quest in Edo-period Japan. Their approach caught the eye of Emmy voters after Blue Eye Samurai earned two noms for outstanding animated program and outstanding sound editing for an animated comedy or drama series. Ahead of a second season, Green says that, in style and ambition, their series has aimed beyond the peals of clashing swords and blood splattering on brutish warriors and toward a style of vivid animation with a live-action attitude to target adult fans of Games of Thrones or The Crown. “The goal was that people would forget…

Sarah Paulson is having a day when we chat about her recent Emmy nomination for outstanding guest actress in a drama series. “My dogs are shitting everywhere, so let’s just pretend that nothing’s happening,” she says moving through her living room on Zoom. Incidentally, it was a dog — and Paulson’s natural wit — that led to her role as John (Donald Glover) and Jane (Maya Erskine) Smith’s unnamed therapist on the Prime Video series when she found herself in Glover’s vicinity at last year’s Vanity Fair Oscar party. “Somebody had their dog, and I’m a dog obsessive, and Donald was standing there, and I was doing a bit about the dog, talking about how fabulous it was to be at the Vanity Fair party, and he was chuckling at…

Da’Vine Joy Randolph is having a great 2024. After sweeping through an awards season that culminated in an Oscar for her portrayal of a bereaved cafeteria manager in The Holdovers, she’s now received her first Emmy nomination. But “breakout year” isn’t quite how Randolph would describe her recent windfall. “What I appreciate is that with every role that I’m doing, yearly it’s having an effect in a way that feels new, in a way that feels like, ‘Oh, she’s making an impact again,’” says the Only Murders in the Building guest star. “Now it’s kind of my goal to be a breakout every single time I do a project.” Randolph is nominated for her role as Detective Donna Williams in the Hulu dramedy’s “Sitzprobe” episode — her only appearance in…

Of the many tableaux that TV fans expected to watch this season, Eugene Levy tearing up while standing in a Glasgow synagogue wearing a tartan-patterned yarmulke was probably not high on the list. But there he was, seeking out where his mother’s Eastern European refugee family had prayed a century ago, in one of the many insightful and slyly warm moments from The Reluctant Traveler with Eugene Levy. “He didn’t know exactly what he was going to be walking into,” David Brindley, executive producer of the Apple TV+ series, tells THR. “I think it was in him to want to do these [kinds of] things. He just didn’t know it,” adds writer David Reilly. Stanley Tucci showed you the life you wish you had. Anthony Bourdain plumbed the mysteries of…

Making history as the first Black woman to be nominated for an Emmy for outstanding directing in a drama series was the furthest thing from Salli Richardson-Whitfield’s mind the morning nominations were announced. “Winning Time wasn’t even on my radar,” the first-time Emmy nominee admits. Richardson-Whitfield’s manager had called to let her know that Gilded Age, on which she’s an executive producer and director, received a nom for outstanding drama series — a win that felt big enough for Richardson-Whitfield, who has never attended the Emmys. “I was like, ‘Great! I get to go to the party,’” she recalls. “Then he calls me up later and he’s like, ‘Salli, you got nominated!’ I was like, ‘For what?’ He says, ‘For Winning Time,’ and I can’t say what I was saying…

Cory DeMeyers, the Emmy-nominated supervising stunt coordinator behind The Righteous Gemstones, had a variety of ridiculous scenarios to tackle on season three of the HBO comedy about a deeply dysfunctional family that runs a Southern megachurch. There was a brawl in which one actor was fully nude. There was an elaborate car chase. But perhaps the wildest scene of all involved a monster truck called The Redeemer built specifically for the occasion. A monster truck is not to be messed with. “You have to constantly remind even the stunt performers and the crew that, ‘Yes, everything’s going great, everything’s working the way we want it to, but let’s not get too comfortable because this is a 12,000-pound killing machine that we’re working with on set and we have to respect…

Blue Eye Samurai’s Emmy nomination this year for best animated program comes 20 years after the category honored a different series inspired by feudal Japan. Debuting on Aug. 10, 2001, Cartoon Network’s Samurai Jack focused on a Japanese samurai prince (voiced by Phil LaMarr) traveling through time and space with his unbreakable katana to battle the shape-shifting demon lord Aku. Cartoon Network’s head of programming at the time, Mike Lazzo, got an unconventional pitch for the series from Genndy Tartakovsky, who had previously created Dexter’s Laboratory for the channel and had served as a writer and director on The Powerpuff Girls. “He said, ‘Hey, remember David Carradine in Kung Fu? Wasn’t that cool?’ and I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s really cool,’” Lazzo once recalled. “That was literally the pitch.” According…