The Emmy nominations were released yesterday. There is a lot of good news to recognize most especially the fact that two women — Lean Dunham and Amy Poehler — were nominated for their comedy writing. According to Nellie at Deadline having two women nominated for comedy writing is a big and not very frequent deal. The last time it happened was a decade ago.
I counted only a handful times in Emmy history when two female writers have received comedy writing nominations, the last time in 2002 when Jennifer Crittenden was nominated for the Marie’s Sculpture episode of Everybody Loves Raymond and Julie Rottenberg & Elisa Zuritsky for the My Motherboard, My Self episode of Sex & The City.
And the piece also says that women writers have only won in this category three times since it was created in 1955. Those women are: “Treva Silverman in 1974 for The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Diane English in 1989 for the pilot of Murphy Brown and Tina Fey in 2008 for an episode of her NBC series 30 Rock.”
So while it is great to celebrate the advent of “peak vagina” in comedy writing, it was not a great year for women directors in drama and miniseries where there were no women nominated. And Lena was the only female director nominated for comedy.
The most interesting news is Lena Dunham received multiple nominations for writing, directing and acting. Louis CK was the only other person nominated in the same fashion.
List of female nominees:
Outstanding Comedy Series
Girls
30 Rock
Lead Actress In A Comedy Series
Lena Dunham, Girls
Melissa McCarthy, Mike & Molly
Zooey Deschanel, New Girl
Edie Falco, Nurse Jackie
Amy Poehler, Parks And Recreation
Tina Fey, 30 Rock
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Veep
Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Comedy Series
The Big Bang Theory — Mayim Bialik
Desperate Housewives — Kathryn Joosten
Modern Family — Julie Bowen as Claire Dunphy
Modern Family — Sofia Vergara
Nurse Jackie — Merritt Wever
Saturday Night Live — Kristen Wiig
Outstanding Guest Actress In A Comedy Series
Glee — Dot-Marie Jones
Saturday Night Live — Maya Rudolph
Saturday Night Live — Melissa McCarthy
30 Rock — Elizabeth Banks
30 Rock — Margaret Cho as Kim Jong-il
Two And A Half Men — Kathy Bates as Charlie Harper
Outstanding Directing For A Comedy Series
Girls — Lena Dunham, Director
Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series
Girls — Lena Dunham
Parks And Recreation — Amy Poehler
Outstanding Lead Actress In A Drama Series
Damages — Glenn Close
Downton Abbey — Michelle Dockery
The Good Wife — Julianna Margulies
Harry’s Law — Kathy Bates
Homeland — Claire Danes
Mad Men- Elisabeth Moss
Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Drama Series
Breaking Bad — Anna Gunn
Downton Abbey — Maggie Smith
Downton Abbey — Joanne Froggatt
The Good Wife — Archie Panjabi
The Good Wife — Christine Baranski a
Mad Men — Christina Hendricks
Outstanding Guest Actress In A Drama Series
The Good Wife — Martha Plimpton
Grey’s Anatomy — Loretta Devine
Harry’s Law — Jean Smart
Mad Men — Julia Ormond
Shameless — Joan Cusack
Smash- Uma Thurman
Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series
Mad Men — Semi Chellas and Matthew Weiner
Mad Men — Andre and Maria Jacquemetton
Mad Men — Erin Levy and Matthew Weiner
Outstanding Lead Actress In A Miniseries Or A Movie
American Horror Story — Connie Britton
Game Change — Julianne Moore
Hemingway & Gellhorn — Nicole Kidman
Missing — Ashley Judd
The Song Of Lunch (Masterpiece) — Emma Thompson
Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or A Movie
American Horror Story — Frances Conroy
American Horror Story — Jessica Lange
Game Change — Sarah Paulson
Hatfields & McCoys — Mare Winningham
Page Eight (Masterpiece) — Judy Davis
Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie or a Dramatic Special
The Hour — Abi Morgan
All the Funny Ladies: What the Emmy Nominations Tell Us About a Year of Women in Comedy (XX)
EMMYS: Lena Dunham & Amy Poehler Score Rare Double For Female Comedy Writers (Deadline)
