60th Annual Primetime Emmy Nominations: Reaction
And the nominees are: pretty surprising!
The nominations for the 60th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards were announced early Thursday morning, and Emmy voters threw the TV world some serious curveballs by straying from safe bets (aka the usual). This year’s nominations, in fact, are historic.
In the Outstanding Drama Series category, AMC’s Mad Men and FX’s Damages became the first basic-cable series to ever be nominated.
It was an altogether huge morning for Mad Men, the undisputed critical darling of television--especially now that HBO's The Wire has ended--but a show that viewers have yet to truly warm up to. Its third-best 16 nominations (behind only HBO’s John Adams with a staggering 23 and NBC’s 30 Rock with 17) should go a long way towards alleviating the latter issue when the series’ second season premieres later this month.
Mad Men was the only show to draw a smattering of applause and excitement each time its name was mentioned by Neil Patrick Harris and Kristin Chenoweth, who announced the nominations--and are nominees themselves. (Chenoweth caused a minor stir when she digressed during the announcements and claimed that she “had a date with” Survivor host Jeff Probst and “he’s totally cute.” She later confirmed her surprising revelation, saying, “I hope he’s not mad at me.”)
Then there’s Amy Poehler, who became the first-ever Saturday Night Live cast member to be nominated in an acting category (she's up for Outstanding Supporting Actress, Comedy). It could be a bittersweet honor for the actress, however, with recent rumors suggesting that she has done her last Hillary Clinton impression for SNL and will make the leap to primetime for NBC’s spinoff of The Office.
Poehler took the spot away from some big-name actresses, but it was only the tip of the iceberg that is snubbery. Let’s take a look at the main categories...
For a list of the 60th Annual Primetime Emmy Nominations, click here!