Cable networks emerged with half of the awards from the Creative Arts portion of the Emmy Awards on Sept. 12.
Home Box Office continued to be the heavy favorite among Emmy voters, winning 16 of the honors in the ceremony that highlights the skills of behind-the-scenes workers such as editors, costume designers and sound mixers.
HBO’s most-honored show was Carnivale, which received five Emmys — an amount equal to the entire take at the ceremony by either ABC or NBC. Voters liked Carnivale’s art direction, cinematography, costumes, hairstyling and main title design.
FOUR FOR 'ANGELS’
HBO’s most nominated show, the miniseries Angels in America, started its haul with four awards in technical categories including art direction, casting, nonprosthetic makeup and sound mixing. That show earned 21 nominations in all.
Stage mainstay Elaine Stritch’s swan song, an autobiographical one-woman show, was named the top variety, music or comedy special, beating out the Oscars telecast, a concert by Paul McCartney and comedy specials by Ellen DeGeneres and Chris Rock.
In addition to HBO’s wins, A&E Network received four Emmys; Cartoon Network, Showtime, USA Network and Discovery Channel each received two; and Bravo, FX, and Lifetime each received one. A juried Emmy was previously announced in individual achievement in animation for Nickelodeon’s My Life as a Teenage Robot: The Wonderful World of Wizzley. Cable earned awards in 31 of 61 categories, including the juried award.
Among broadcasters, PBS was the top winner with seven statuettes; followed by Fox with six wins and one juried award; ABC and NBC, with five each; UPN with two; and CBS and The WB, with apiece.
Voters declared that Bravo’s Queer Eye for the Straight Guy was best reality program.
'SAMURAI’ STUNNER
Cartoon Network had a monopoly on the animation Emmys given at the ceremony, thanks to animator Genndy Tartakovsky. His Samurai Jack was named as the best animated program less than one hour, beating out other popular series such at The Simpsons, Futurama, SpongeBob SquarePants and South Park.
Tartakovsky also was responsible for an innovative series of cartoons based on the last Star Wars saga, and that strip — Star Wars: Clone Wars — won the Emmy for programming more than one hour.
A&E scored for its concert productions. Performances by both Sting and Paul McCartney brought the network three of its four Emmys.
FX’s plastic-surgery series Nip/Tuck appropriately won for best makeup prosthetics.
