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Emmy Voting to Be More Democratic

Feb 4, 2009  •  Post A Comment

The Emmys are getting a little more populist this year.
The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences said Wednesday that its Board of Governors has voted to end the so-called “two-phase” selection process for choosing best comedy and drama series nominees.
Last year, nominees were determined by combining the votes from special blue-ribbon panels and from the Academy’s overall membership. Now, nominees for the best drama and comedy series categories will be decided solely based on the votes of the overall membership. Nominees for the acting categories will be determined by acting peer group members.
The change in the series nominating rules could make it more difficult for smaller shows, particularly on cable, to get nominated. ATAS had implemented the two-phase nomination process in order to balance the “wisdom of the masses” with the point of view of Academy members who had screened particular episodes of a show.
In another populist move, the Academy has also decided to expand from five to six the number of nominees in 10 key categories, including comedy and drama series, as well as lead and supporting actors. The unscripted categories are not being expanded.
ATAS said the expansion of nominees was a result of a review of voting patterns in recent years that shows a large number of ties in nomination balloting. That resulted in six nominees in many categories; the rules change simply makes the expansion permanent.
No changes are being made to the process of voting for final winners in each category.
(Editor: Baumann. Updated 12:10 p.m. to note change in series nominating rules. Deletes last paragraph.)

5 Comments

  1. I’m not sure what is fair and just, except I do know that the best and brightest are often overlooked in favor of the tried and true. It is sad they can’t find a method where the most talented are honored. Maybe insisting that voters actually watch the submitted episodes would do it. Seeing is believing.
    Too many great performances will never be recognized, like Jensen Ackles showing so many layers and such complexity in his character, Dean Winchester on Supernatural. Most don’t even know the show exists so what chance does he have even though he is the best actor working on TV with the most captivating character ever?
    *Sigh* I guess that means I get to keep our huge Ackleslicious secret and the rest of the world must wait for his big screen career to explode before they discover him. I would love for the Academy to prove me wrong… really, I would! B.J.

  2. Hey, I knew the Emmy Awards were in some trouble years back when every possible live body from the marketing department at the cable net I worked for was encouraged to get memberships so they would vote for our programs. I doubt whether these folks ever watched television in the first place and they actually did just vote the party line and were certainly unqualified and ill-informed.
    Kind of soured me on the whole thing. With these new rules, at least the TV Academy will probably get a big influx of new members from cable networks hoping to gain even more influence.

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