Dorian TV Award Nominations

by Nathaniel R

Pose leads the nominations

The Society for LGBTQ+ Entertainment Journalists, previously known as GALECA, has announced their annual TV nominations ahead of Emmy balloting. A handful of us here at TFE are part of that organization so we had a chance to vote on this. The third season of FX's Pose and Disney+ & Marvel Studio's limited series WandaVision lead the nominations though curiously the latter is not up for the main award in its category. I May Destroy You, It's a Sin, and Mare of Easttown also secured plentiful nominations.

Without further ado the nominees...

BEST TV DRAMA

Bridgerton

The Crown

Lovecraft Country

P-Valley

Pose

BEST TV COMEDY

The Flight Attendant

Girls5eva

Hacks

PEN15

Ted Lasso

BEST LGBTQ SHOW

I May Destroy You

It's A Sin 

Love, Victor 

Pose

Veneno

Happy to see Love, Victor here since it was just barely released and I assumed it would miss. The second season is stronger than the first with character arcs I've personally never seen investigated with such care and screentime before (parent's reacting to their child's coming out). Usually that sort of thing gets one scene or one episode, tops. Ana Ortiz and James Martinez have really risen to the challenge.

BEST TV MOVIE OR MINISERIES

I May Destroy You

It’s a Sin

Mare of Easttown 

Small Axe

The Queen’s Gambit

What a list right? Any one of them would make an excellent winner.

BEST UNSUNG SHOW

A Black Lady Sketch 

Show
Girls5eva

Love, Victor 

Search Party

Veneno 

We Are Who We Are

BEST TV PERFORMANCE
Michaela Coel, I May Destroy You
Kaley Cuoco, The Flight Attendant

Thuso Mbedu, The Underground Railroad
Elizabeth Olsen, WandaVision
Billy Porter, Pose

MJ Rodriguez, Pose

Jean Smart, Hacks

Jason Sudeikis, Ted Lasso

Anya Taylor-Joy, The Queen's Gambit

Kate Winslet, Mare of Easttown

We've just switched to gender neutral categories which is why there are 10 nominees. Billy Porter and Jason Sudeikis are the only men nominated. 

BEST SUPPORTING TV PERFORMANCE

Gillian Anderson, The Crown

John Boyega, Small Axe

Pappa Essiedu, I May Destroy You

Kathryn Hahn, WandaVision

Marielle Heller, The Queen's Gambit

Callum Scott Howells, It’s a Sin

Dominique Jackson, Pose

Julianne Nicholson, Mare of Easttown

Jean Smart, Mare of Easttown

Bowen Yang, Saturday Night Live

Very pleasantly surprised to see Callum Scott Howells here for It's a Sin. Though I personally thought him a standout but I did not actually vote for him (we only had three votes per category which makes it tough!) and assumed the quiet reserved nature of his role would leave him without honors this year. 

BEST TV MUSICAL PERFORMANCE

Lady Gaga, "The Star-Spangled Banner," Biden-Harris Inauguration

Jonathan Groff, "You’ll Be Back," Hamilton 

Kathryn Hahn, "Agatha All Along,” WandaVision

Elton John & Years & Years, "It’s a Sin,” BRIT Awards 2021

Punkie Johnson, Anya-Taylor Joy, Lil Nas X, Kate McKinnon, Bowen Yang, "Pride Month Song," Saturday Night Live

Bowen Yang (as The Iceberg That Sank the Titanic), “Loverboy,” Saturday Night Live 

Not pleased with 3/5ths of this category as there were better options, but all of the nominees are fun! 

BEST TV DOCUMENTARY OR DOCUMENTARY SERIES

Framing Britney Spears

I'll Be Gone in the Dark

Pretend It’s a City

Pride

Tina

BEST CURRENT AFFAIRS SHOW

Full Frontal with Samantha Bee

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

The Amber Ruffin Show

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert

Ziwe

BEST ANIMATED SHOW

Big Mouth

Bob’s Burgers

Harley Quinn

Invincible

South Park: The Pandemic Special

BEST REALITY SHOW

Legendary

Nailed It

Queer Eye

RuPaul’s Drag Race

The Great British Bake Off

MOST VISUALLY STRIKING SHOW

Bridgerton

The Crown

Lovecraft Country

Pose

Small Axe

The Mandalorian

WandaVision

I do not know why this category has 7 nominations while the others have 5; one would assume ties unlikely given ranked voting. Curious.

CAMPIEST TV SHOW

At Home with Amy Sedaris

Dolly Parton's Christmas on the Square

Eurovision Song Contest

Ratched

WandaVision

I personally always abstain from this category as nobody agrees on the definition of "camp" and I can never get behind a whole category of it.

WILDE WIT AWARD

(
To a performer, writer or commentator whose observations both challenge and amuse)

Michaela Coel

Kathryn Hahn

Fran Lebowitz

Randy Rainbow

Bowen Yang    

What do you think of these nominations? 

Comments

[Tony]

2 for Jean Smart!! :)

[Bev]

Snubbing Kominski is pure ageism. Guess what? You're all gonna get old and you're all going to look ridiculous with those haircuts.

[NATHANIEL R]

Bev -- what haircut? I'm bald ;0)

[Angel Alvarez Ortiz]

I hate gender neutral categories! You miss the opportunity to reward more artists! I hate that!

[NATHANIEL R]

angel -- i also hate it for that reason.

[Susanita]

Mare of Easttown is Kate Winslet's best way to show the Academy that she was unfairly ignored and deserved a nomination for Ammonite. She's showing them! Really! How to watch that movie and don't nominate her? I'm sure they'll nominate her as compensation for a minor work.

[jules]

Winslet gives the best performance by an actress in the past year in Mare of Easttown, but that doesn't mean she deserved an Oscar nomination for the very wet Ammonite. It does mean she should be cast more often as a modern woman; it's so refreshing to see her play one.

[Peggy Sue]

If not even the gays can respect the holiness of the words "Best Actress" it means we're lost as a species.

[Parker]

To increase artists being honored, what if they gave performances awards by genre/format like they do for the shows overall? Why compare Pappa Essiedu's work to Kathryn Hahn's? And Bowen Yang's job is completely different than anyone else's on that list, which is almost entirely from miniseries.

Great nominees overall! And you're absolutely right about camp, no one agrees on what it means, but Dolly must be the only thing on that list to even come close: musical spectacle + the most earnest sentimentality.

[Roge]

Very happy to see VENENO nominations.

[Manos]

Boooo for the combined acting categories. And since they decided to do it, they should nominate only 5 actors just like in any other category, not 10. It's hypocritical since they want to gain both the hype from such a decision and the star power with many well known hames in their nominations.

[ScottC]

Continue to love the love for Jean Smart. And Marielle Heller. And good to see We Are Who We Are hasn't been forgotten.

[ben1283]

Absolutely baffled by all the praise for It's A Sin, which felt so pedestrian and was saddled with a truly dreadful leading performance in Olly Alexander. Its refusal to really engage with the politics of the time, or to give so many of its supporting players actual characters to play beyond 'saintly' or whatever we were supposed to take away from Roscoe's storyline with Stephen Fry...And to top it off with maybe the only bad performance I've ever seen Keeley Hawes give? It just wasn't for me, I guess!

[NATHANIEL R]

ben1283 --- i loved iT'S A SIN but my two qualms about it were 1) the leading performance which was the weakest (and that's always so unfortunate) and 2) that it felt so rushed. I later heard that they originally had a higher episode count which would explain that rushed quality.

[NATHANIEL R]

i'm just now realizing that GENERA+ION was snubbed and that's so upsetting. such a good show.

[CharlieG]

Am I the only one who thought the last season of Pose was a little overwrought with speechy/preachy dialogue that no one would actually say to another person? And why do I feel bad just mentioning this? I just think the writers felt like they had to get 40+ minutes of dialogue in, but couldn't quite flesh everyone out, knowing it was their last season. Dominique was the MVP though.

Also, Black Lady Sketch Show is one of the most consistently funny things on TV. While the second season dipped a little, that first season cannot be beat.

Lastly, any love for Michaela Coel and I May Destroy You is welcomed. Such a great Miniseries (or whatever it is being categorized as).

[Lucky]

Veneno is great. If more people dared to watch shows in foreign languages, they'd be so rewarded.