There Are No Good Answers for New Emmys Date

While the news that the 75th Primetime Emmys would not be taking place on September 18 seemed inevitable, there are glaring reasons one could infer as to why the supposed new January date has not been made official.

As Variety previously reported, the Television Academy would prefer to move the awards telecast to November, a move that has precedent (the 2001 Emmys were delayed with respect to the 9/11 tragedy). Meanwhile, Fox as the Emmys broadcast partner this year is the one pushing for January, and that direction seems more plausible only because a traditional ceremony needs a host, writers, talent participation, and at least a month of pre-production, and even if the strikes were to end this week, November would still be a challenge to pull off.

That said, January is mostly booked already. The first few Sundays of 2024 have the Golden Globes, then the Critics Choice Awards, then Sundance the next two weekends, and finally the Grammys on February 4. The appeal of January may be Fox seeing it as an opportunity to have a major awards show that can compete with its network competitors during the traditional awards season. With fans being more primed to watch awards shows in the winter anyway, it is fair to think it may cause a ratings bump.

But whatever benefit that may be to the broadcast partner, the January move does dampen the Emmys’ influence over the rest of the TV awards. For example, the final voting for the SAG Awards begins January 17. Having the Emmy winners already announced for the corresponding categories by then would make the SAG winners a more foregone conclusion. Instead of the Emmys being able to boast being the first ones to give a series like “Beef” major awards recognition, Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards could now beat the TV Academy to it.

With as unpredictable as an end to the strikes is, the Emmys could have to wait even longer than January to broadcast, and therefore would probably have to move back its whole 2024 calendar, which often starts with official for your consideration events kicking off at the very start of March. Of course, the Globes and CCAs would want talent participation too, so they would also likely postpone, but what was once a distinct, useful gap between the Emmys in September, and winter TV awards being handed out in their aftermath months later, is crunching into a 10 car pile-up of award shows that will have to fight even harder to stand out.

The one silver lining may be that these shows touted by TV Academy voters get extra time to market themselves as an Emmy nominee, but the Emmys need to somehow find a date that will allow them to maintain the impact behind that title. Unfortunately, there is just no good solution right now.

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By: Marcus Jones
Title: There Are No Good Answers for New Emmys Date
Sourced From: www.indiewire.com/awards/consider-this/no-good-answers-what-date-move-emmys-1234891669/
Published Date: Thu, 03 Aug 2023 19:30:00 +0000