UPDATE: The below tallies are limited to comedy, drama and limited series categories, with 11 male director and 9 female director nominees. Variety, reality and nonfiction directing categories are still wildly skewed in favor of men, with 21 to 4. In total and across all categories, men outnumber women nominees 32 to 13.
In a category often lacking in diversity, this year’s Emmy nominations for Outstanding Directing saw near gender parity, with almost half of those recognized being women. Some of the notable nods include female-helmed episodes of “Only Murders in the Building,” “Hacks” and “Succession.”
Palestinian American actress-director Cherien Dabis directed the critically lauded episode “The Boy From 6B” for “Only Murders,” which was depicted entirely from the perspective of Theo (James Caverly), a deaf character.
“I’m speechless!” Dabis said in a statement. “Which I guess is appropriate because I’ve been nominated for a silent episode! Seriously though, I’m beyond thrilled. This is particularly special because this episode is so unique, inventive and ambitious. I’m incredibly grateful to the writers and show-runner / co-creator John Hoffman and Hulu for boldly taking a risk on a dialogue-free episode of a half hour comedy and for inviting me on to do such meaningful work. I’m grateful to actor James Caverly who challenged me to think deeply about visually crafting the episode with a deaf audience in mind. I’m so excited to share this recognition with the absolutely brilliant cast and crew! Thanks so much to the Television Academy for this tremendous honor.”
Creator-showrunner Lucia Aniello scored a nod for “Hacks” Episode 201. Meanwhile, Cathy Yan (who was also the filmmaker for “Birds of Prey”) garnered a nomination for “The Disruption,” a Season 3 episode in “Succession.”
Yan, who is a first-time nominee for her work on “Succession” (the first TV episode she’s directed), said in a statement to publications: “Thank you to the Academy. I had an absolute blast directing on my favorite show and am so honored to be nominated with this talented group. It’s a privilege to have worked with Jesse Armstrong, Mark Mylod and the incredible cast and crew of ‘Succession.’ It was the highlight of my pandemic.”
Other noteworthy noms included ones for Lorene Scafaria for “Succession’s” deeply sad “Too Much Birthday” and Karyn Kusama for the bone-chilling “Yellowjackets” pilot, as well as Francesca Gregorini for an episode of “The Dropout” and Bridget Stokes for “A Black Lady Sketch Show.” Amy Poehler also received a nomination for Prime Video’s “Lucy and Desi.”
Gregorini said in a statement, “I am thrilled beyond measure to have been nominated for my directing work on ‘The Dropout.’ It goes without saying that we are only as good as our collaborators, so I would like to acknowledge Liz Meriwether, Amanda Seyfried, Michael Showalter on their well-deserved nominations and all of the amazing talent in front and behind the camera.”
Additionally, this season also saw women receive almost 40% of the nominations in the scripted writing categories, with a third of this year’s nominees for Outstanding Writing in all writing categories being women.
