Downton and Wolf Hall miss out at Emmy Awards
THEY may be the most acclaimed dramas Britain can muster, but the
likes of Downton Abbey, Wolf Hall and The Honourable Woman were eclipsed by the might of America at this year’s Emmy Awards.
The television series received among the lowest number of major Emmy awards in a decade, failing to win any prizes.
Instead, it was left to the writers to keep the UK’s end up, with Armando Iannucci and Simon Blackwell bringing home the honours for their screenplays for US series Veep.
In the end, it was American channel HBO which was the biggest winner, with Game of Thrones winning a recordbreaking 12 awards in one year. The previous record was held by The West
Wing, with nine. The results appear to echo warnings issued by the BBC in recent months, that it will struggle to keep up with ma- jor global broadcasters with its current model and levels of funding.
It has just announced plans for a Netflix-style service in which US residents will be able to pay to watch its best series to boost its international profile.
Previous Emmy Awards have seen British actors and ITV or BBC shows triumph in major categories, with programmes such as Sherlock, Prime Sus
pect and myriad period dramas. Britain’s best hopes for 2015 had been carried by Wolf Hall, the critically acclaimed adaptation of Hilary Mantel’s Booker-winning novels, which received three nominations for “outstanding limited series”, lead actor for Mark Rylance and supporting actor for Damian Lewis.
Downton, which has previously won 11 Emmys, had two nominations for Joanne Froggatt and Jim Carter as best supporting actress and actor.
Viola Davis made history after becoming the first black actress to win the lead category for her role in How To
Get Away With Murder.