The 2016 Primetime Emmy Awards which were handed out on Sunday night came a few surprises and snubs in store. While “Veep” won the best comedy series award, “Game of Thrones” won in the drama category. “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story” also earned several awards, while Julia Louis-Dreyfus won her fifth consecutive Emmy in the comedy actress category.
This was the second consecutive year that “Game of Thrones” and “Veep” took top honors, which helped propel HBO to six Emmys on Sunday night and 22 Emmys over all (some categories were awarded previously), the biggest haul of any programmer. FX was right behind with 18 wins, including six on Sunday.
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It only took four seasons, but Tatiana Maslany has finally won an Emmy for Oustanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for her work in . From the very debut of the show, Maslany's work has been singled out by both fans and critics alike because she doesn't have to just play one character well. Given the show's premise ” she plays47 different characters, each with different personality traits, quirks, and accents, often playing against herself in many scenes.
But for the first two seasons of the show, Maslany's name was strangely absent when Emmy nominations were announced. Then last year, Maslany was nominated but ended up losing to Viola Davis, who made Emmy history by being the first black woman to win the award. This year, Maslany was up against Davis (and other acclaimed actors) once again,
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Rami Malek just won his first-ever Emmy for his role as Elliot in USA's Mr. Robot. Malek accepted the award for Outstanding Lead Actor in A Drama Series by stepping on stage and whispering to the audience, "Please tell me you're seeing this too," mimicking the nervous paranoia of the character he plays on the show.
"I play a young man who is like so many of us profoundly alienated," Malek said, "and the unfortunate thing is, I’m not sure how many of us would want to hang out with a guy like Elliot. I want to honor the Elliots because there’s a little bit of Elliot in all of us, isn’t there?"
Malek is now the first Egyptian-American to win an Emmy for acting.
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Julia Louis-Dreyfus won her fifth consecutive Emmy for Best Actress (passing a tied record between Candice Bergen and Mary Tyler Moore) in a comedy for , and this was an emotional one: Her father, William Louis-Dreyfus died just a couple of days prior. She dedicated the win to him: “I'm so glad that he liked , because his opinion was the one that really mattered.”
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The most nominated comedy series (with 11 nominations) to not win a single Emmy on the primetime telecast, HBO’s tech industry satire is still an underdog when it comes to industry kudos.
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Later in the night, after “The Voice” won the best reality show, Mr. Burnett, a producer for that show as well, shot back at Mr. Kimmel saying that the host gave “another five minutes of free publicity” for Mr. Trump.
Not surprisingly, this year’s divisive election played a significant role in this year’s ceremony. Lamenting the possibility of a Donald J. Trump presidency, Mr. Kimmel lit into the reality show producer Mark Burnett, who was one of the creators of NBC’s “The Apprentice,” the show that made Mr. Trump a nationwide television star. With ABC’s camera firmly squared on Mr. Burnett ” who laughed the entire time, despite the charged barbs ” Mr. Kimmel said that if Mr. Trump is elected president, Mr. Burnett is the man to blame.
“If he’s elected and he builds that wall, the first person we’re throwing over it is Mark Burnett,” Mr. Kimmel said.
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FX’s “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story” was a ratings hit and a darling of critics, and now a big-time Emmy winner.
In addition to winning the limited series Emmy, Ms. Paulson, Mr. Vance and Mr. Brown all won acting awards. Mr. Vance and Mr. Brown both beat co-stars to win. Nearly every feature player on the show was nominated for an award, a total of six in all.
