New Primetime Emmy Awards Rules

NORTH HOLLYWOOD: The Television Academy has passed a set of new rules for the Primetime Emmy Awards, including further clarifying the definition between comedy and drama series and of series and limited series.

Due to the dramatic increase in series production, the number of nominees for comedy and drama series has been increased from six to seven. Also, to clarify the difference between the comedy and drama series categories, series with episodes of 30 minutes or less are defined as a comedy; those with episodes of more than 30 minutes are presumed to be a drama. Producers may formally petition a new Academy industry panel to consider their series’ eligibility in the alternative category.

Miniseries will be changed to limited series and defined as programs of two or more episodes with a total running time of at least 150 program minutes that tell a complete, non-recurring story, and do not have an ongoing story line and/or main characters in subsequent seasons. Comedy and drama series will continue to be defined as programs with a minimum of six episodes that have an ongoing story line, theme and main characters presented under the same title and with continuity of production supervision. Producers may formally petition for review by the industry panel to change category eligibility.

In terms of qualifying as a guest actor, only performers appearing in less than 50 percent of a program’s episodes are now eligible to submit in the guest actor category. The variety series category is now split—outstanding variety talk, to be awarded during the Primetime Emmy telecast, and outstanding variety sketch, to be included in the Creative Arts Emmy program.

In an effort to expand member participation in the voting process, and to take advantage of the Academy’s extension of online voting to both rounds, all voters eligible to vote in a category’s nominating round are now eligible to vote in that category’s final round, so long as they meet two additional requirements: much like the former Blue Ribbon panel process, voters must watch the required submitted material online and attest to no specific conflicts of interest with the nominees.

Bruce Rosenblum, Television Academy chairman, said, “We are excited to announce that our Board of Governors and senior industry executives have taken meaningful time to address, in a forward-thinking manner, many of our existing rules and procedures. Our over 17,000 voting members represent a dramatically changing television industry and we need to continue to make sure we honor their creativity in the most relevant and fair ways possible.

“As our growing membership creates and produces more content for ever-changing platforms, today’s changes in the rules and procedures are vital. We’re sure that in coming years we will continue to evolve our rules as our dynamic industry grows.”