Recently, the nominations for the 74th primetime Emmy Awards were announced. Shows like Squid Game, Stranger Things, Succession, Ted Lasso, and Abbott Elementary led the nominees. But how does one get nominated for an Emmy? Who votes on it? Who submits me for it? In the era of streaming and prestige television, there are literally hundreds of performances each season vying for 5-8 slots for the best of the year.

Like any awards season campaign, chances for getting nominated for something are based on a myriad of factors. It starts by putting in a worthy performance. Then you, your agent, and your publicist can make a decision to “go for it”. Essentially you are making a reel (slightly longer than your average demo reel) of your best work in a single episode or over a season.

Certain networks and certain showrunners consistently get nominated year after year, particularly due to their well received work, and well-organized awards machine. If you’re on that certain network or that certain mega showrunner; you’ll already have an advantage of not having to hustle as hard for the attention.

Videos do have to fit a certain format and file sizes, which can be found at emmys.com

There’s a $300 processing and entry fee. This is waived for TV Academy members. Sometimes the rep or studio will cover cost, sometimes not. So for the unknown performer taking a shot, this is a risk expense coming out-of-pocket.

THE PERFORMING CATEGORIES

Lead Categories

It is up to the actor on whether or not they’ll submit in this category, but the consensus is if you appear as a continuing character in more than 50% of the episode all season, you’re a lead.

Supporting Categories

Its up to the actor on whether or not they’ll submit in this category, factors that can make this decision easier are: ensemble shows of 6+ actors, a show where there is a definitive lead, or a scenario where you’re a 2nd or 3rd lead that would be in direct competition with your 1st lead.

Guest Categories

In the past, actors submitting here would appear in a single episode. Now, rule changes have the actor appear in less than 50% of the episodes’ season. This has expanded eligibility for performers who are recurring characters, but not series regulars. However, they still have to choose clips from ONE episode.

IT’S ALL IN THE CLIP

As I had mentioned earlier, you are making a reel of your best work. Here are some scenarios in deciding on how to choose your submission material.

Length & Range

The average length hovers between 5 and 15 minutes. At the end of the day, you want to begin STRONG and finish STRONGER. Whoever is judging your tape doesn’t have to watch 100% of your submission to make a decision, it can prompt them for a vote after a certain percentage of the video is watched.

A great series of clips is not just one yelling scene after another, but a series of clips showing your character in different moods, situations, as multi-dimensional. Maybe its the long monolouge scene of you chewing the scenery, but damn is so good by capturing our attention and making us feel something!

The Debut, The Penultimate Episode, The Season Finale

The first episode, the last episode of the season usually brings the climatic and emotional fireworks that lends to Emmy bait.

In a debut or pilot, we see the start of our hero’s journey, and the inciting incidents that propel them to action- whether that journey is a whole season or the whole series.

In a finale, we see the conclusion of the character arc that results in redemption, atonement, accountability, judgement, love, success, or even death. Lately, in shows like Game of Thrones, the second to last episode brings this climax with the finale bringing us an aftermath.

The Second Half of the Episode

In last 30 minutes of a drama or the last 15 minutes of a comedy, we usually see the payoff of the episode.

The third act brings in all the emotional fireworks mentioned in the last paragraph, it is definitely where a cliffhanger is brought in, either to our delight or dismay.

THE VOTING PROCESS

Your submission is reviewed by a peer group of qualified academy members in each category (actors for actors, musicians for musicians, etc). Each votes on the performances by ranking numbers- the highest rankings receive the nomination.

The number of nominations are based on the number of submissions received. That’s why one category can have six nominations, while the other has eight.

The selection of the winners can be a delicate process as well, but to summarize it best: everybody can vote in series program categories (except for animation and documentary), peer groups can only vote for each other (writers for writers, directors for directors).

Each group can choose a judging system of a single vote per category or a yes/no vote (nomination is worthy of an Emmy).

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