‘Shōgun’ leads all Emmy nominees with 25 and ‘The Bear’ sets comedy series record with 23
LOS ANGELES— The Bear went on a tear at Wednesday morning’s Emmy nominations with a comedy-series record 23, and Shōgun led all nominees with 25 in a dominant year across categories for FX. Nominations for the The Bear, up for its second season in which its rag-tag band of sandwich makers tries to create an elite restaurant, included best comedy series and best actor in a comedy series for Jeremy Allen White—both awards it won at January’s strike-delayed ceremony—along with best actress for Ayo Edebiri, who won best supporting actress last time around.
It was also boosted by a bounty of guest acting nominations, including Jamie Lee Curtis and Olivia Colman, two of many Oscar winners who landed nominations.
Shōgun took full advantage of the absence of last year’s top three nominees— Succession, The White Lotus and The Last of Us— to dominate in drama and give FX, with 93 overall nominations, the kind of strong year often reserved for HBO, which even in this “off” year received 91.
Its nominations included best drama series, best actress in a drama series for Anna Sawai and best actor for Hiroyuki Sanada.
The show shook up the drama race when its makers said in May that despite reaching the end of the story of James Clavell’s novel about political machinations in early 17th century Japan, they would explore making more than one season, shifting the critical darling from the limited series category to the more prestigious drama one.
True Detective: Night Country was a bright spot for HBO, which lost Succession to retirement and is between seasons on The White Lotus and The Last of Us.
The show, a semi-spinoff of the True Detective franchise, led all limited or anthology series nominees with 19, including a best actress nomination for Jodie Foster for playing a police chief investigating mysterious deaths in the darkness of a north Alaskan winter.
Kali Reis, who plays Foster’s investigating partner and rival on the show and is nominated for best supporting actress in a limited series, joins Lily Gladstone, in the same category for Under the Bridge, as the first Indigenous women to get Emmy acting nominations. D’pharaoh Woon-a-tai of Reservation Dogs becomes the first Indigenous actor to be recognized for lead with his best actor in a comedy nom.
The only previous Indigenous acting nominee, according to Variety, was August Schellenberg, who received an Emmy nomination in 2007 for his performance as Sitting Bull in the HBO TV movie Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.
Netflix has its own pair of contenders in the category. Baby Reindeer became a minor cultural phenomenon and Emmy upstart in recent months. It got 11 nominations, including best actor for star and creator Richard Gadd. Ripley, a black-and-white retelling of Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Talented Mr. Ripley, got 13 nominations including acting nods for Andrew Scott and Dakota Fanning. The shows along dozens of acknowledgements in craft and comedy special categories, helped Netflix lead all outlets with 107 nominations.
Foster was another of the Academy Award winners to get Emmy nods, along with fellow multiple Oscar winner Meryl Streep, up for best supporting actress in a comedy for Only Murders in the Building; reigning best supporting actor winner Robert Downey Jr., up for best supporting actor in a limited series for playing several characters in The Sympathizer; and Gary Oldman, up for best actor in a drama series for Slow Horses.
Only Murders, a perennial Emmy nominee for Hulu with few wins, outdid itself this year with 21, behind only Shōgun and The Bear. Leads Steve Martin and Martin Short were nominated for best actor, and, in her first Emmy nomination as a performer, Selena Gomez got a nod for best actress.
Old Emmy favorites also returned. Jon Hamm, who had one Emmy from 16 previous nominations, most of them for Mad Men, got two nominations, one for actor in a limited or anthology series for Fargo and another for supporting actor in a drama for The Morning Show. His Morning Show castmate Jennifer Aniston is considered by many the favorite to win the best drama actress Emmy to go with the comedy actress trophy she won for Friends.
The Crown with 19 nominations and Hacks with 16 each make triumphant returns to the Emmys after their own years off. Each had especially acclaimed seasons. Elizabeth Debicki is considered the closest thing in these Emmys to a lock to win best supporting actress in a drama for playing Princess Diana in the last days before her death in the sixth and final season of The Crown.