Wednesday, July 16, 2025

My (Honestly) Mostly Pleased Reactions to the 2025 Emmy Nominations, Part 2: Comedy

 

Bit of a humble brag: I was incredibly accurate with the bulk of my predictions and in some cases the only reasons I was inaccurate was because I overestimated how many nomination would be in each category. All things considered I'm pretty satisfied.

 

OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES

I got seven of the eight nominees correct and I knew in my heart that What We Do In The Shadows would be here instead of Somebody Somewhere. That didn't mean the Emmys didn't complete ignore it…first things first.

The biggest sign of how quickly The Bear has fallen is clear. Last year it led all comers with 27 nominations. This year is has thirteen and is in a distant third. The Studio would seem to be the out and front runner with 23 nominations but we were in this exact situation last year and Hacks still managed to win. It's in second this year with 14.

Shrinking managed 7 and Abbott Elementary 6 but as you'll see below the ones they got will almost all be decided on Emmy night. Only Murders in the Building dropped to 8 nominations this year but it may still have room to succeed. Nobody Wants This 'only' got three but again all of them are major ones. What We Do In the Shadows got five but aside from Best Comedy none of them were ones that count the same way.

 

OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR IN A COMEDY

My only error was expecting that there would be six nominations instead of the five that I was told would happen. This category by far will be the toughest one to pick of the night: Adam Brody, Seth Rogen, Martin Short and Jeremy Allan White each have one major critics award to their credit so far and Jason Segel can hardly be underestimated.  I will get to The Studio later this summer to see if I can rank him before I try to predict things.

 

OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTRESS IN A COMEDY

This is where I stumbled and arguably the biggest surprise of the comedy nominations took place. It didn't take a genius to know that Quinta Brunson, Ayo Edebiri and Jean Smart would be back for the second straight year and I was very confident that Kristen Bell would be here for Nobody Wants This even if she was slightly surprised. (To be fair, she has been here before. A lot.) But I was certain that Natasha Lyonne would be back here for the second season of Poker Face and if she wasn't, Selena Gomez would be.

It never occurred to me Uzo Aduba would be here for the (now canceled) Netflix series The Residence. I do realize the show was extremely popular (hence the reason its cancelation stunned so many) but I didn't think Aduba could prevail against a very stacked lineup. She has now made Emmy history: the first African-American woman to be nominated for three different TV shows. I imagine that will keep her warm when Jean Smart wins her fourth straight Emmy.

 

OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A COMEDY

THEY NOMINATED JEFF HILLER FOR SOMEBODY SOMEWHERE!.

To be clear he's deserved a nomination as much as Bridget Everett did but I didn't dare even dream of him getting recognized by the Emmys. Everett's gotten more than her share of Best Actress nominations so I thought she had a more likely chance. So obviously I'm overjoyed. Even more overjoyed than…

THEY NOMINATED HARRISON FORD FOR SHRINKING!

Okay I shouldn't be as excited as that because everyone said it was a given but everyone thought it was a given last time too and it just didn't happen. He may very well be the favorite going into the Emmys and I hope he wins. Now let's more calmly look at the rest and there are some disappointments.

I expected to see Michael Urie here, figured Ebon Moss-Bachrach would be here for the third straight year for The Bear (he has no real chance for a three-peat though) and I expected to see Ike Barinholtz in this category. It's the other two nominations that trouble me.

I'm not that upset Paul W. Downs wasn't nominated as an acting, as I said he's nominated in two other categories that's fine. But nothing for Tyler James Williams this year?  I can understand picking Bowen Yang for Saturday Night Live in a sense; he's been nominated multiple times in this category. My bigger problem is Colman Domingo getting nominated over Williams.  This may be a judgment call I haven't seen The Four Seasons but I thought Williams was a lock and his being ignored bothers me. Anyway let's go on.

 

 

OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A COMEDY

Okay I got six of seven. Liza Colon-Zayas for The Bear, Hannah Einbinder for Hacks, Janelle James and Sheryl Lee Ralph for Abbott Elementary, Jessica Williams for Shrinking and Catherine O'Hara for The Studio. And much as I wanted to get Meg Stalter nominated, I'm perfectly fine with Kathryn Hahn being nominated for The Studio as well. This more than makes up for the misadventures of Agatha All Along.

GUEST ACTOR AND GUEST ACTRESS IN A COMEDY

Another sign of how The Bear has fallen. Last year, they had seven nominees across both of these categories. This year, they're down to three. Granted both Jamie Lee Curtis and Jon Bernthal did win last year but it's harder to see them winning again.

I'll obviously be watching The Studio to see just how good all of the cameos by the guest actors and actresses are but I was fine with Ron Howard, Martin Scorsese and Bryan Cranston before.  I'm a little perturbed that Kaitlin Olson isn't present for Hacks (or Abbott Elementary) but it's balanced by nominations for Julianne Nicholson (you did double dip!) and standout Robbie Hoffman. Thrilled to see Cynthia Erivo here; at least Poker Face wasn't ignored.

 

OUTSTANDING WRITING FOR A COMEDY

They found room for Bridget Everett, after all. I didn't think she'd manage to get a nomination for writing after all this but still, overjoyed. Also impressed by the presence of The Rehearsal in this category – and it makes sense to be here for writing.

The usual suspects are here for Abbott Elementary and Hacks. Everett will double dip with Seth Rogen for The Studio and Quinta Brunson for Abbott. Another sign that The Bear's run is over: no nominations in this category at all. The sixth contender: What we Do In the Shadows.

 

OUTSTANDING DIRECTOR IN A COMEDY

A very interesting quintet. Ayo Edebiri double dips for her direction of Napkins and Seth Rogen officially becomes the TV equivalent of Warren Beatty – he's nominated in four categories. Lucia Aniello is up for Hacks, a category she's won in once before. Nathan Fielder is up for The Rehearsal.

But the ultimate industry veterans is present for James Burrows, for his work directing Mid-Century Modern. I've long since lost track how many nominations and wins Burrows has – he must have gotten dozens for Cheers and Frasier alone. Will the veteran prevail or will it go to a new (ish) face?

 

NOTABLE EXCLUSION

None to really write home about. I confess to being surprised Lyonne isn't here after winning at the Astras last month but there are no overwhelming surprises. Along with Andor I'll be watching The Studio to give a complete report on how well it ranks. That said, I'm still pretty sure Hacks will repeat – after all, there are a lot of duplicates for The Studio there aren't for the latter.

 

Tomorrow I will wrap things up with my reactions to the nominations in the Outstanding Limited Series category – and we can strike TV Movie entirely from that discussion. It actually turned out better than I dared hope.

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