Soccer and Iconic Stars Score Big at Sunday Creative Arts
Welcome to Wrexham nets five awards to lead the night; programs with Carol Burnett and Michael J. Fox grab high-profile honors; RuPaul makes it eight straight as reality competition host.
Welcome to Wrexham, the FX reality series about an underdog Welsh soccer team lifted from obscurity after being acquired by Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, put its best foot forward at the Sunday-night installment of the 75th Creative Arts Emmys, leading the way with wins in five categories.
The show scored statuettes for outstanding unstructured reality program, its director, Bryan Rowland, and its cinematography, picture editing and sound mixing teams.
Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie — the Apple TV+ documentary about the former Family Ties star and his challenges living with Parkinson's disease — followed Wrexham with four awards.
In addition to being named outstanding documentary or nonfiction special, Still captured Emmys for its director, Davis Guggenheim, and for its music composition and picture editing.
Another longtime television star was in the spotlight with the final award of the evening. That was when Carol Burnett — who had been name-checked with admiration by winners and presenters throughout the ceremony — came to the stage when NBC's Carol Burnett: 90 Years of Laughter + Love won the Emmy for outstanding pre-recorded variety special. As one of the program's executive producers, Burnett took home the seventh Emmy of her remarkable career.
A significant victory occurred when RuPaul Charles of MTV's RuPaul's Drag Race grabbed the award for outstanding host for a reality or competition series for the eighth consecutive time. The show also won for its picture editing.
In other streaks, HBO's A Black Lady Sketch Show marked a "threepeat" when it nabbed the award for outstanding picture editing for variety programming for the third time in a row. The recognition was one of three nominations for team member Stephanie Filo, wwho also received nominations in the 75th Emmys competition for her work as a picture editor on the Hulu comedy History of the World Part II and the Netflix limited series Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.
Also marking three in a row was CNN's Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy, which once again prevailed in the category of outstanding hosted nonfiction series or special.
Other notable awards include a second career Emmy for former U.S. President Barack Obama, who took the award for outstanding narrator for the Netflix program Working: What We Do All Day.
The streaming platform Peacock, which won the first Emmy in its history at the Saturday-night Creative Arts ceremony when Judith Light took a guest acting award for the comedy series Poker Face, scored its second-ever Emmy on Sunday night, when the reality competition program The Traitors won for its casting.
Jeopardy! won the Emmy for outstanding game show, and Keke Palmer captured the award for outstanding game show host for NBC's Password.
In other awards, the long-running Fox series The Simpsons grabbed outstanding animated program, Netflix's Queer Eye was named outstanding structured reality program, Hulu's 1619 Project won for outstanding documentary or nonfiction series and exceptional merit in documentary filmmaking went to National Geographic's The Territory.
The evening's presenters, in order, were: Jeff Probst (Survivor); Derek Hough and Julianne Hough (Dancing with the Stars); Kate Berlant and John Early (Would It Kill You to Laugh?); Adam Blackstone and Rickey Minor (Super Bowl Halftime Show, The Oscars); Lala Kent, Tom Sandoval, Tom Schwartz and Scheana Shay (Vanderpump Rules); Lori Greiner (Shark Tank); Alan Tudyk (Grimsburg); Duff Goldman (Baking Championships); Chelsea Lazkani, Amanza Smith, Chrishell Stause and Bre Tiesi (Selling Sunset); Lisa Vanderpump (Vanderpump Villa); John Walsh (America's Most Wanted); Kid Cudi (Entergalactic); Donald Faison and Abigail Spencer (Extended Family); Robin Thede (A Black Lady Sketch Show); Bri and Nikki Garcia (Twin Love); Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal (Good Mythical Morning) and Padma Lakshmi (Top Chef, Taste the Nation).
Bob Bain was executive producer of the Creative Arts Emmys for the ninth time. The Television Academy's Creative Arts Emmy Awards Committee is led by cochairs Charlie McBrearty and Nena Erb.
FXX will broadcast edited highlights from the Saturday and Sunday Creative Arts Emmys on Saturday, September 13, at 8:00 PM ET/PT. It will be available for streaming on Hulu on Sunday, January 14.
The 75th Emmy Awards telecast will air live Monday, September 15, on Fox.
A complete list of winners for the 75th Creative Arts Emmys is available here.
Also see: The Last of Us Comes in First at Saturday Creative Arts Emmys.