Adam Scott, left, and Britt Lower in a scene from Severance on Apple TV+.The Associated Press
Severance could separate itself from the competition and reach the upper echelons of the Emmy Awards when nominations are announced Tuesday morning.
The dystopian workplace drama from Apple TV+ achieved a convergence of acclaim and audience buzz for its second season that often leads to the kind of Emmy dominance enjoyed in recent years by Succession and Shogun.
But a flowering of Emmys tends to follow HBO’s The White Lotus wherever it goes, and HBO Max’s newcomer The Pitt could challenge for nominations and for wins when the trophies are handed out in September.
All will benefit from the absence of Shogun, which last year led all Emmy nominees with 25 and set a record for wins in a season with 18. Its second season is still in the early stages of production and it shouldn’t be around for next year’s Emmys either.
Severance has become a signature show for Apple TV+. The streamer has gotten plenty of Emmy nominations for dramas including The Morning Show and Slow Horses, and Ted Lasso was downright dominant on the comedy side.
But Apple has lacked the kind of breakaway prestige drama that HBO seems to produce perennially.
Adam Scott and Britt Lower are virtual locks for lead acting nominations for what amounted to dual roles as their characters’ “innie” work selves and “outie” home selves. Tramell Tillman is just as likely to get a nod for playing their tone-shifting, pineapple-wielding supervisor, and Ben Stiller is bound to get a directing nomination.
“Severance” got 14 nominations for its first season in 2023, but won just two, for its music and its title sequence.
Nominations will be streamed live beginning at 11:30 a.m. Eastern at Emmys.com/nominations.
Noah Wyle, left, Mackenzie Astin and Rebecca Tilney, right, in a scene from HBO Max’s prestige medical procedural The Pitt.Warrick Page/The Associated Press
Two categories were announced early on CBS Mornings. The nominees for talk series are The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Jimmy Kimmel Live and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
The nominees for reality competition series are: The Amazing Race; RuPaul’s Drag Race; Survivor; Top Chef and The Traitors.
Apple TV+’s Hollywood satire The Studio could draw a host of comedy nominations for its first season as it takes on previously dominant Emmy veterans like Hacks and The Bear.
The Studio star and co-creator Seth Rogen could get nods for acting, writing and directing, and the show’s all-star guest stars, including Zoë Kravitz, Martin Scorsese and Ron Howard, may also add some novelty to the nominations.
Hacks star Jean Smart has won best lead actress in a comedy for all three previous seasons of the HBO Max series, and is the favorite for the fourth. The show won best comedy series last year too.
The Bear set a record for comedy nominations with 23 last year for its acclaimed second season. This year, its third season is up for Emmys (even though its fourth has already aired). It got a more lukewarm reception, leaving its status coming into the nominations murky.
The White Lotus, HBO’s darkly comic resort drama, submits all the members of its big ensemble cast in supporting categories, which they tend to dominate. Its Thailand-set third season included ballyhooed performances from Walton Goggins, Carrie Coon, Parker Posey and Sam Rockwell among several others.
The Pitt, HBO Max’s prestige medical procedural starring “ER” veteran Noah Wyle, had reached the top tier of most prognosticators’ Emmy prediction lists by the time its first season ended in April. Wyle, who was nominated five times without a win for “ER,” could join Scott to make best actor in a drama a two-man race. And the show’s other doctors and nurses, played by lesser known actors, could draw nominations if The White Lotus cast leaves them any room.
Last year, the British Netflix production Baby Reindeer was surprisingly dominant in the limited series categories. This year, it will surprise no one if the Netflix British crime drama Adolescence does the same in the same categories. It was probably the most acclaimed show of the year. Fifteen-year-old Owen Cooper, who plays the 13-year-old accused of a killing at the center of the story, is likely to get one of several acting nominations.
All the shows are living in the splintered world of the streaming era, and the like the Oscars its most acclaimed nominees rarely have the huge audience they once did. While an impressive average of 10 million people per episode watched Wyle on The Pitt at some point on HBO Max, according to Warner Bros. Discovery, 30 years ago an average of 30 million sat down on the same night and watched him on “ER” on NBC.
The broadcast networks have largely become Emmy non-entities, with a few shining exceptions. ABC’s Abbott Elementary has annually drawn plenty of comedy nominations and should get its share this year. And Oscar-winner Kathy Bates is a front-runner for the best actress in a comedy Emmy for her role on CBS’s Matlock. She would be the first person nominated in the category from a network show since 2019, and the first to win it since 2015.
CBS will air the 77th Primetime Emmy Awards from the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles on Sept. 14. Nate Bargatze is slated to host.
