The Emmy’s had a quandary to deal with this year—how to separate and honor more series in the ever-growing world of reality TV. They did so by breaking non-competition series into two parts—structured and unstructured reality—and the result was a boon for Discovery and Bravo.
The reality-competition program category was, of course, led by CBS’ perennial victor, The Amazing Race, which has won nine of the 11 times the award has been presented. The other two winners—Bravo’s Top Chef in 2010, NBC’s The Voice last season—were also among this year’s nominees. Filling out the field were ABC’s Dancing With the Stars and Lifetime’s Project Runway.
The outstanding reality show host category also has some previous winners returning for another shot at gold. Last year’s tandem victors, Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn of Project Runway, are back, as is 2012 victor Tom Bergeron (Dancing With the Stars). Cat Deely (Fox’s So You Think You Can Dance) earned her fourth-straight nom, and Betty White had her third in a row as host of NBC’s Betty White’s Off Their Rockers. Jane Lynch of NBC’s Hollywood Game Night rounds out the mix.
Undercover Boss on CBS won the last two Outstanding Reality Program Emmys, and will this year compete for the structured reality program award, given to reality series that follow a certain format. It’ll have familiar company in last year’s reality program nominees Antiques Roadshow (PBS), Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives (Food Network), MythBusters (Discovery) and Shark Tank (ABC). The lone new entry in the field is TLC’s genealogy docuseries Who Do You Think You Are?
That left the unstructured reality category wide open, with only 2011 best reality show winner Deadliest Catch (Discovery) among returnees from last season. But anyone betting on seeing duck calls and pawn shops among the field lost their chips. Fans of real estate series, however, will have some rooting interest as Bravo’s Flipping Out and Million Dollar Listing New York take up two of the spots. Deadliest Catch’s network mate Alaska: The Last Frontier also gets a shot, with A&E’s popular new series Wahlburgers the fifth nominee.
Amazing Race, Deadliest Catch, Project Runway, The Voice and CBS stalwart Survivor each earned nominees in the reality cinematography and editing categories. The other pick in the former category is Alaska: The Last Frontier. For editing, Discovery’s Naked and Afraid earned a well-deserved nom.
