The 2017 Primetime Emmy Awards, to be hosted by Stephen Colbert Sept. 17 and aired on CBS, promise an evening of suspense—and possibly surprises—for this year’s especially competitive slate of nominees. Will the 69th annual ceremony crown the youngest ever winner, or will it produce a tie for most acting wins ever? Impress everyone at your office water cooler or Emmys viewing party with these fun facts, records, and other trivia.
NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” and HBO’s “Westworld” topped this year’s nominations list with 22 each. The 42nd season of “SNL” set a record for most nominations in a year for a variety show and extended its own record of most nods ever for a single program, amassing a grand total of 231. It’s unlikely anything will catch up; the long-canceled runner-up, “ER,” totaled 124.
Thanks to both “SNL” and its breakout hit “This Is Us”—the first outstanding drama nominee from a noncable network since 2011’s “The Good Wife”—the Peacock Network rocketed from 41 nods last year to 64. This means that after HBO Entertainment/Films (111 nods) and Netflix (91), the season’s most-nominated studio is 20th Century Fox and its subsidiary Fox 21 Television Studios (53). Most impressive, however, is probably streaming service Hulu, which jumped from two nods in 2016 to this year’s 18.
In 2016, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, star of HBO’s “Veep,” won her fifth consecutive trophy for outstanding lead actress in a comedy series, her sixth overall in the category (counting “The New Adventures of Old Christine” in 2006, plus a supporting comedy actress win for “Seinfeld” in 1996). If she triumphs again this year—and who could argue with her odds?—she will hold the impressive record for most statues for the same acting role in the same series, and tie with Cloris Leachman for most Emmys ever for a performer, male or female. However, fellow nominee Allison Janney of CBS’ “Mom,” who joined the ranks of honorees in both leading and supporting categories for the same role, also has seven total wins....
“Veep,” this year’s top earner of any comedy, began with three nods in 2012 and has only increased its haul, following with five, nine, nine, 16, and now 17 nominations. But could the outstanding comedy series winner of the last two years be bested by “Atlanta,” the 2017 Golden Globe winner and only freshman series nominated in the category? First-time nominees honored in more than one category include that show’s Donald Glover (impressively nominated for leading actor, writing, and directing), Riz Ahmed (“The Night Of,” “Girls”), Mindy Sterling (“Con Man,” “Secs & Execs”), and Ann Dowd (“The Handmaid’s Tale,” “The Leftovers”).
If 13-year-old Millie Bobby Brown takes home the Emmy for supporting actress in a drama, she’ll become the ceremony’s youngest winner ever (ousting 14-year-old “Something About Amelia” winner Roxana Zal of 1984). At the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards, which don’t distinguish between leading and supporting roles for TV, Brown lost to lead actress Emmy nominee Claire Foy of “The Crown.”
In fact, the most recent SAG Award winners who are now Emmy-nominated may offer clues about front-runners; they include John Lithgow (also of “The Crown”), William H. Macy (“Shameless”), and Louis-Dreyfus. This year’s Emmy-eligible Golden Globe winners, meanwhile, are Foy, Glover, and Tracee Ellis Ross (“Black-ish”). Who are you betting on?
Last but not least, don’t forget this year’s new Primetime Emmy categories! They include three new interactive program categories, plus outstanding casting in a reality series and music supervision (recognizing the orchestration of preexisting songs, not to be confused with original dramatic score). In addition, cinematography for a single-camera series has in 2017 been distinguished between one-hour series and for half-hour series.
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