Reality TV receives 54 Emmy Awards noms, 'Dancing' leads again

It's deja vu all over again for the nominees of the Emmys' two biggest reality tv awards.


Twenty-two reality television series received a total of 54 nominations in today's announcement of the 62nd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards, however the nominations include the exact same Outstanding Reality Competition category nominees for the fourth straight year and repeat nominations for all of the host award nominees. 

While the number of shows is the same as last year, the nominations figure is a decline from last year's record-setting 63 nominations.

Leading the 2009-2010 reality TV Emmy Awards nomination field for the fourth consecutive year is ABC's Dancing with the Stars, which received nine nominations from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences -- one fewer than the reality record-setting 10 nominations it received last year.

CBS' The Amazing Race was next with seven nominations -- including one in the Outstanding Reality Competition category it has won every year since the Academy created it seven years ago.  Just like each of the last three years, The Amazing Race will compete against American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, Project Runway, and Top Chef for the award.


The Amazing Race host Phil Keoghan was also received a nomination in the Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality-Competition Program category -- the second-straight year he has been nominated for the award.

Keoghan will compete against American Idol host Ryan Seacrest, Dancing with the Stars host Tom Bergeron, Project Runway host Heidi Klum, and Survivor host Jeff Probst in the category, which Probst has won both times it has been awarded since its 2008 creation. 

All five nominees were also nominated in the category last year -- where they were joined by a shared nomination for Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi and Tom Colicchio, who was nominated as "co-host" alongside Lakshmi despite the Bravo show's credits billing the chef only as lead judge and mentor.  Lakshmi and Colicchio did not receive a nomination this year, leaving the category with a five-nominee field.

Bergeron, Klum and Seacrest were all also nominated for the award during its inaugural year -- when they co-hosted the 2007-2008 Primetime Emmy Awards ceremony (disastrously) along with Probst and fellow nominee Howie Mandel.

The Amazing Race also received nods for cinematography, directing, picture editing, sound editing, and sound mixing while Dancing with the Stars also got nominations for hairstyling, lighting, makeup, sound mixing, and technical direction as well as a pair of choreography nods in which Derek Hough was nominated both individually and with Chelsie Hightower.


While they are both major awards, the host and reality competition nominations were the only nominations received by Project Runway, which moved to Lifetime from Bravo during the Emmy's 2009-2010 eligibility period.

Seacrest's nomination was one of the six nods that Fox's American Idol received, ranking it third among reality series nominees.  The show also received nominations for art direction and short-form picture editing as well as a pair of nominations for sound mixing.

In addition to its Outstanding Reality Competition nomination, Top Chef also received nods for cinematography, interactive media creative achievement, and picture editing.  In addition, its Top Chef Masters spinoff received a cinematography nomination, giving the reality franchise a total of five nominations.

Discovery's Deadliest Catch received four nominations -- including one in the eclectic Outstanding Nonfiction Series category, where it will compete against five other non-reality programs: Discovery's Life; IFC's Monty Python: Almost the Truth; and PBS' American Experience, American Masters and The National Parks: America's Best Idea.

Deadliest Catch also received cinematography, picture editing and sound mixing nominations.


While it was shut out of both major awards it was eligible for, Fox's So You Think You Can Dance received two nominations for outstanding choreography -- one each for choreographers Mia Michaels and Stacey Tookey -- and one for outstanding makeup.

In addition to Probst's hosting nomination, CBS' Survivor also received two additional nominations for cinematography and picture editing.

Discovery's Dirty Jobs and Animal Planet's Whale Wars round out the list of multi-nominees with two nominations each.  However despite Whale Wars' critical acclaim, Dirty Jobs was the only one of the two that was nominated in the Outstanding Reality Program category, which covers non-competition reality programming.

Whale Wars did receive two nominations for cinematography and picture editing.

Dirty Jobs will compete against ABC's Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, Bravo's Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List, Discovery's Mythbusters, CBS' Undercover Boss, and PBS' Antiques Roadshow -- which most television viewers wouldn't normally consider "reality" despite the Academy's categorization -- in the Outstanding Reality Program category.


While Dirty Jobs, Mythbusters and Antiques Roadshow were all also nominated in the category last year, this year's field does not include A&E's Intervention, which won the award last year (as Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List viewers are well aware, Griffin's series won the category the prior two years).

Intervention did receive one nomination for picture editing.

Six other reality series also received one nomination each -- ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, Discovery's Man vs. Wild, Fox's Hell's Kitchen, NBC's The Biggest Loser, Sundance Channel's Brick City, and Travel Channel's Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations.

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition was nominated for picture editing and Man vs. Wild got a nod for cinematography.  Hell's Kitchen got a nod for art direction while Brick City received an exceptional merit nomination and Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations landed a nomination in the Outstanding Writing for Nonfiction Programming category.

The Biggest Loser was nominated in the Outstanding Creative Achievement in Interactive Media - Nonfiction category alongside Top Chef and NBC's The Jimmy Fallon Show.


The 62nd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards will be presented on Saturday, August 21 (in the "creative arts" categories) and Sunday, August 29 (in the "major" categories, including Outstanding Reality-Competition Program and Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality-Competition Program).






About The Author: Steven Rogers