The overwhelming dominance of three series – Succession, The Bear and Beef – throughout the 75th Emmy Awards seriously dented the suspense that makes up much of the charm of this type of event. The fourth and final season of the fratricidal battle between the children of media mogul Logan Roy dominated the drama category, allowing Succession to bow out in style, arms laden with trophies.
In addition to the award for Best Drama Series, creator Jesse Armstrong took home the Emmy for Best Screenplay, series mainstay Mark Mylod for Best Director, while Sarah Snook and her on-screen brother and husband, Kieran Culkin and Matthew Macfadyen, walked away with the acting awards. Succession crushed its most serious rival, the post-apocalyptic series The Last of Us, another HBO Max production from the Warner Discovery group, leaving just the award for Best Supporting Actress to Jennifer Coolidge in The White Lotus.
On the comedy front, The Bear's Chicago neighborhood restaurant, took the place of Ted Lasso's British football club in the hearts of voters at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for Best Comedy Series. Christopher Storer, the creator of The Bear, was honored as writer and director, as were performers Jeremy Allen White (male lead), Ayo Edibiri (supporting actress) and Ebon Moss-Bachrach (supporting actor). Quinta Brunson won the Best Female Actress trophy for her role as a schoolteacher in Abbott Elementary, a Disney production like The Bear (the former broadcast on ABC and the latter on the cable channel FX and streaming on Hulu).
Up against Hollywood's historic majors, Warner and Disney, streaming platform Netflix managed to do well with its miniseries Beef, a very dark tale of a confrontation between two angry motorists, in a category – mini-series or feature film intended for television – that doesn't distinguish between drama and comedy. Beef was awarded with Best Mini-Series, Director and Screenwriter (Lee Sung Jin), Actress (Ali Wong) and Actor (Steven Yeun), losing only the Supporting Actor to Paul Walter Hauser for Black Bird (Apple TV+) and Niecy Nash-Betts for Dahmer (Netflix).
This 75th edition of the Emmys should have taken place in September 2023, but strikes by Hollywood screenwriters and actors led to its postponement. This change of date for the ceremony did not, however, lead to an extension of the period taken into consideration when choosing the winners. For example, Trevor Noah, host of the satirical TV show The Daily Show, was honored even though he left the show at the end of 2022.
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