Emmys<\/a>. Although the L.A.-based Television Academy and New York-based National Academy of TV Arts & Sciences have done a good job in recent years creating guardrails on who should honor, say, game shows or children\u2019s programming, the land of the doc is still all over the map.<\/p>\n\n\tAfter all, the TV Academy itself has two competing categories, with the aforementioned documentary or nonfiction special and another dubbed \u201cexceptional merit in documentary filmmaking.\u201d That one is normally reserved for more serious docs about heady subjects (this year\u2019s two nominees are \u201cThe Librarians\u201d and \u201cThe Tale of Silyan\u201d), although in 2025 the bio-doc \u201cI Am: Celine Dion\u201d wound up there too.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe exceptional merit category is \u201clooking for documentaries that have a profound social impact or filmmaking technique, as opposed to a straightforward documentary that might be biographical or entertainment based,\u201d TV Academy VP of awards Julie Shore says.<\/p>\n
\n\tBut isn\u2019t that also what NATAS is looking for in its News & Documentary Emmys competition? That show hands out awards in 24 categories. How do filmmakers figure out where to submit their work?<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cIt starts at the network level, where they\u2019re strategizing their awards for the year,\u201d says Shore. \u201cOur categories have been more entertainment-focused, where NATAS has more genre-based categories, if it\u2019s political or investigative, historical, more news-focused content.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tBut not completely. As crime documentaries become favorites in the pop culture zeitgeist, some of them are being entered into the Primetime Emmys \u2014 even though there\u2019s also a \u201ccrime and justice\u201d category at the News & Doc Emmys. And in entertainment, News & Doc has an \u201carts and culture documentary\u201d field, where this year\u2019s nominees included a film about TV host Ed Sullivan and another about the 50th anniversary of \u201cJaws\u201d \u2014 docs that could have easily been entered into the Primetime Emmys.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe two TV academies do coordinate to make sure no one\u2019s trying to enter their docs in multiple Emmy contests. But here\u2019s where things get confusing: If you submit your project into News & Docs, your narrator can still submit into the Primetime Emmys, since NATAS doesn\u2019t have a narrator category. And if you submit your doc to the Primetime Emmys, your researcher can submit to News & Docs, since the TV Academy doesn\u2019t have an award for that line of work.<\/p>\n
\n\tHey, to confuse things even more, let\u2019s throw the Oscars into the mix. Because docs frequently get both big and small screen runs, and are often commissioned by TV networks, it\u2019s always a bit vague whether they should be considered TV or film. Filmmakers can\u2019t submit to the Emmys if they\u2019ve already been nominated for an Oscar, but the motion picture academy doesn\u2019t have that same rule \u2014 and sometimes double dipping can still occur.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s great that they have choices,\u201d Shore says. Marty, life may be short, but the awards season for documentaries can be quite long.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Emmy voters are faced with quite the Sophie\u2019s Choice when it comes to this year\u2019s outstanding documentary or nonfiction special nominees. Look at the embarrassment of riches when it comes to celebrity profiles: You\u2019ve got two legendary Canadian comedians and \u201cSCTV\u201d pals facing off with \u201cJohn Candy, I Like Me\u201d and \u201cMarty, Life Is Short,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11867,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/variety.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/My-Mom-Jayne-image-1.png?w=1000&h=563&crop=1","fifu_image_alt":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1362,4045,14725,14723,2076,1263,5683,14724,802],"class_list":["post-11866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-awards","tag-awards-circuit-column","tag-category","tag-celebrityled","tag-documentaries-to-watch","tag-documentary","tag-emmys","tag-filled","tag-news-documentary-emmys","tag-nominees"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehotedit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}