The Film Experience

by Christopher James

Quinta Brunson faces off against two previous Emmy winners for the first season of "Abbott Elementary."

Variety in nominations is rare this Emmy season. Thus, the Lead Actress in a Comedy Series race stands out. This is the only category amongst drama and comedy acting honors wherein more than half of the nominees come from shows without a Series nomination.

This makes watching the nominated episodes a bit more fun. There are only so many times one can watch every episode of Hacks and Ted Lasso, no matter how good they are! In addition, it makes the race a little easier to call. The last time an actress won this prize for a show not nominated for Outstanding Comedy Series was when Melissa McCarthy surprised with a win for Mike & Molly in 2011, which (not) coincidentally was the same year she was the breakout star of Bridesmaids in movie theaters. Let’s analyze the race after the jump...

THE NOMINEES

Rachel Brosnahan - The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel - Episode: “How Do You Get To Carnegie Hall?” (Season 4, Episode 8)
- Description (IMDB): Midge and Joel debate Greek mythology. Susie finds a second phone line. A blizzard brings unexpected consequences.
Quinta Brunson - Abbott Elementary - Episode: “Pilot” (Season 1, Episode 1)
- Description (IMDB): While on Abbott's annual zoo field trip, Tariq reveals that he has been offered a job in New York; Janine struggles with a big choice; Barbara starts questioning her future after finding out her favorite tuatara has been retired because of old age.
Kaley Cuoco - The Flight Attendant - Episode: “Drowning Women” (Season 2, Episode 5)
- Description (IMDB): After finding potentially incriminating photos in Benjamin's office, Cassie seeks assurances from Shane - and continues to avoid Marco - while Megan searches for an all-important lockbox.
Elle Fanning - The Great - Episode: “Alone At Last” (Season 2, Episode 3)
- Description (IMDB): Catherine's grief over the loss of Leo during the coup finally catches up with her. Peter's part in Leo's death, and the discovery that he just murdered a noble, causes Catherine to lock Peter in his apartment with his mummified mother.
Issa Rae - Insecure - Episode: “Reunited, Okay?” (Season 5, Episode 1)
- Description (IMDB): At her ten-year college reunion, Issa's self doubt quickly surfaces, while Molly struggles to get out of her own head.
Jean Smart - Hacks - Episode: “The Click” (Season 2, Episode 6)
- Description (IMDB): A girls' night out finds Ava attempting to connect with her mother--and Deborah embracing some unexpected company.

ANALYSIS

On paper, this category seems sewn up for Jean Smart. The Hacks star won the prize last year and the show has only grown in popularity. Its nomination count rose from 15 last year to 17 this year. Plus, Smart only continues to get better as comedian Deborah Vance. Season two follows Vance as she leaves her Vegas residency and tries to workshop a new, more personal comedy routine. The show expertly blends pathos and humor, but Smart’s submission leans more heavily on the latter. It’s a fun “girls night out” episode where Deborah picks up a much younger man. Smart had many bigger, more emotional choices, but it’s smart for her to pick an episode where she can “out-funny” the competition.

It’s especially savvy given her main competition. Quinta Brunson has been the biggest breakout of this Emmy season. Her show, Abbott Elementary, has revitalized network television and been a funny, heartwarming look at the struggles and frustrations felt by public school teachers. Brunson headlines the show as Janelle, the Leslie Knope of teachers who fights the system in the pilot so that her students can have a new rug. Since she is also the creator of the show, voters may feel compelled to reward Brunson. However, they can do just that in the Comedy Writing category. Still, she remains formidable competition for Smart.

Brosnahan's Midge Maisel finds her way to Carnegie Hall, thanks to Lenny Bruce (Luke Kirby), in the season four finale of "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel."Though she has won in the past, Rachel Brosnahan is probably much further away from the prize for the fourth season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. The season finale, which Brosnahan submitted, does a fine job of tying together an uneven season. In particular, Brosnahan shines in her scenes with Luke Kirby’s Lenny Bruce (a role that won him an Emmy in the past). However, the show’s steady decline in nominations (it went from 20 to 12 nominations this year) demonstrates waning enthusiasm.

The other three nominees all occupy “happy to be nominated” slots, though they are no less worthy of the prize. The final season of Insecure was one of my favorite seasons of television this past year, largely due to the way Issa Rae threads the needle on her character’s arc. The first episode of the fifth season, “Reunited, Okay?,” provides Rae with some comic highlights, in particular a conversation between current day Issa and her college freshman self. It also demonstrates her dramatic skill as she and Molly (Yvonne Orji) begin to mend their friendship. In a just world, the show would’ve shown up in Series. As it stands though, Issa Rae is one of just three nominations for Insecure this year.

The Great continues to have a baffling run with the Emmys. Last year, it was only nominated for writing and directing for its lavish first season. This year, Elle Fanning and her co-star Nicholas Hoult earned lead acting nominations, but the show only managed two additional craft nominations. Once the show breaks through in a more major way, Fanning could be a threat to win. As Catherine the Great, Fanning does an excellent job wringing comedy out of Catherine’s drive and seriousness. It’s a tricky tonal line to walk but she does it beautifully.

Speaking of tricky, last year’s breakout hit The Flight Attendant fell off the tonal balance beam in its second season, and the Emmys actually noticed. It went from nine nominations last year, including Comedy Series, to just three this year, with Kaley Cuoco the only above-the-line nominee. Cuoco’s Cassie is sober this season, but struggling to maintain that sobriety. She’s moonlighting as a CIA asset, but becomes witness to a brutal murder that puts more and more stress on her life. In her submitted episode, Cuoco fails to give Cassie any sort of modulation, as she frantically flails for 49 uninterrupted minutes. Sometimes it’s meant for comedy, other times it’s meant for drama. However, all of the fun and character-specificity of the first season has been zapped away.

Jean Smart stands to win a second consecutive Emmy for her role as Deborah Vance in "Hacks."

Will Win: Jean Smart - Hacks
Should Win: Jean Smart - Hacks
Spoiler: Quinta Brunson - Abbott Elementary

Who are you rooting for?

MORE ANALYSIS