Emmys broke new ground in diversity with 41% nonwhite acting nominees

TheWrap

The Wrap found that of 115 nominations in all acting categories, including voice-over and short form series, 49 of the 118 performers nominated are nonwhite. "In the major acting categories comedy, drama and limited series, 39 of the 102 nominations — or 38.2% — went to nonwhite performers," reports The Wrap's Reid Nakamura. "That’s an improvement from last year, when 24% of nominations in the top categories went to performers of color. In terms of racial diversity, the comedy categories (42.5% nonwhite) fared slightly better than the drama categories (32.5% nonwhite), buoyed by a supporting actor category made up primarily of Black actors including Andre Braugher of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, William Jackson Harper of The Good Place and Mahershala Ali of Ramy. HBO’s Insecure also received several acting nods this year, including for supporting actress Yvonne Orji, the only nonwhite actress among eight nominees. The diverse list of comedy nominees marks a significant year-over-year shift after 2019’s all-white lead actress, supporting actress and guest actor categories."

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• Only one Latinx actor earned an Emmy nomination -- The Handmaid's Tale's Alexis Bledel: "But not Rita Moreno, who has been killing it on One Day at a Time for four seasons," says Laura Bradley. "Not Laura Gómez, whose performance in Orange Is the New Black’s excellent final season was alternatively haunting and inspiring—and as timely as it gets. Not Melissa Barrera or Mishel Prada of Vida, a series that pushed past stereotypical Latinx stories to discuss deeper, more nuanced issues that pervade our community before it was canceled too soon. Not any of the brilliant performers on HBO’s sublimely weird Los Espookys—including Julio Torres, Ana Fabrega, Bernardo Velasco, and Cassandra Ciangherotti. Not Joaquín Cosío, the beating heart of Netflix’s beautifully complex and raucously funny Gentefied. Not Mj Rodriguez, who alongside lead actor nominee Billy Porter has brought tenacity and boundless spirit to FX’s Pose. And not Harvey Guillén, who plays the lovable wannabe vampire Guillermo in What We Do in the Shadows."
• Why Insecure is the most exciting comedy nominee: "This was TV that derived in power because of how precisely it built on what had come before," says Daniel D'Addario. "Which makes its nominations at this year’s Emmys surprising, as 'what had come before' was not an awards magnet. Insecure’s nominations this year both coincide with a leap forward in quality and seem to serve as an acknowledgement of the preceding three seasons’ of underheralded work it took to get there. They represent a rising tide of representation among the Emmy nominees (with others of this year’s nominees including Zendaya of Euphoria and Regina King of Watchmen, to name just two), and raise the question of what Insecure, in putting together a show this ambitious over the first three years, needed to do to get in. Perhaps the next show led by Black talent as promising and finely-wrought as Insecure will be met with major-scale Emmys success from its inception. What’s most worth celebrating on an exciting day for one of the year’s great shows may be a shift in power between a historically-white show and a show made by Black talent: The Emmys need shows like Insecure on the ballot in order to recognize what’s best on television, but Insecure didn’t need the Emmys to be great."
• For the first time, Black actress dominated the category for lead actress in a limited series or movie: Little Fires Everywhere's Kerry Washington, Self Made's Octavia Spencer and Watchmen's Regina King represent the majority of a category also featuring Mrs. America's Cate Blancett and Unorthodox's Shira Haas.
• Ramy Youssef hopes the Emmy recognition Ramy received paves the way for more Muslim-American shows: "I’m excited for all the shows to come that can use this as a reference point," he says. "When a network is trying to tell them that they’re not famous enough or it’s too specific, I don’t think that can be an excuse when you see the kind of recognition that we’ve been able to get."
• Female directors landed a record 33% of Emmy nominations this year