Who Won the Emmy Nominations; 'Eddington' Reactions; Venice Film Festival Preview

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0:20Ryan Lattanzio:Welcome to Screen Talk, IndieWire's weekly podcast that keeps you up to date on the latest goings on in Hollywood. I'm Ryan Latanzio, and with Anne on vacation this week, IndieWire's awards editor Marcus Jones will join us to discuss primetime Emmy nominations. As Marcus is also going to be at the Venice Film Festival with me this year, we'll share some of our hopes for the lineup, which announces on Tuesday, July 22nd. And also opening this week is Ari Aster's Eddington, which eagle-eyed or eared listeners want to know how Anne and I felt about that one. Becca can, but Marcus has seen it too.

0:58Ryan Lattanzio:So we're also going to take that one on. Thanks for coming on the podcast, Marcus. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to talk Emmys, Venice, all of it. Welcome back. Yeah, you are a very useful resource anytime we get into Emmys on this podcast. Anne watches a lot more TV than I do, but I actually did pretty well in terms of having seen a good number of today's nominees. I guess I wanted to ask you first, who cares about the Emmys? And I don't mean that hypothetically. I mean, really. And why do they matter? I don't know a lot of people in reality outside the industry that even knew the nominations for today necessarily.

1:33Ryan Lattanzio:Whereas I think the Oscars have some more gravitas outside the industry that maybe the Emmys don't. And we can look at the decline in ratings over the years for Emmys to support that. What are your thoughts? No, I think just the same with film. I mean, word of mouth is so important nowadays and Emmys really helps that. And so just in case you are the one person who maybe missed out on Adolescence on Netflix or Paradise on Hulu or anything like that, Emmy nominations are another reminder to check these shows out. And we can get into it, but there are even smaller, critically acclaimed shows that people definitely missed that a lot of critics are super excited got nominations.

2:14Ryan Lattanzio:The other thing is that a lot of these races feel very familiar, right? It's like shows like the bear that's nominated predictably everywhere that that often is. It's funny, like Harvey Guillen, when Quinta Brunson got announced, he said, yay. When Io Debrey announced, he said, yeah, it's like these are inevitable. Like there's like these are baked in every year that these people are going to be nominated. And someone like Jean Smart nominated it again. She's going to win again. You know, she's the Julia Louis-Dreyfus of her time at the Emmys. And so in some ways, it's like I personally kind of tune out of the race.

2:47Ryan Lattanzio:I don't find it as interesting for these reasons, but there always are some things that are surprising. So Marcus, what stood out to you this morning? And how did you do on your predictions? So I did pretty well. If you go by that Golderby experts thing, I was just short of the top. Me and Deborah Birnbaum from Golderby predicted the same amount. So that same category you were talking about, outstanding lead actress in a comedy series. Of course, we knew Quinta, Ayo, Jean were going to be nominated. But part of the fun is seeing that Netflix, which traditionally does not do that well with comedies, not only got Kristen Bell in for Nobody Wants This, which we sort of expected.

3:28But Kristen Bell, as popular as she is on TV, has way less awards nominations than you would think. The Academy was not feeling Veronica Mars. I think Ted Danson got more love for The Good Place. And so it's still kind of like a surprise that this is the show that finally got her in, kind of power of Netflix. Same with Uzo Aduba getting nominated for The Residence, which was canceled. People did not watch this on Netflix. But I think that with her in particular, it's a case of she's just one of those people who's so consistently nominated and has won before. But I think she was nominated when she was the person for the Entreatment reboot.

4:12She won for Mrs. America, I think maybe over Cate Blanchett. And so even in some of these categories where it feels super expected, there are surprises. I mean, what we do in the shadow is getting in again for comedy series. It's been nominated before, but not for what was it? Seven seasons. And so it's nice that it got that farewell. I mean, I would have loved to see Righteous Gemstones get that same farewell. But you give and you take.

4:43Ryan Lattanzio:Speaking of Righteous Gemstones snubs, Bradley Cooper was thought to maybe get a nomination for this final season of the HBO show. But again, it's like the Bradley Cooper effect where he's really earnestly achieving, but not getting honored. What happened there? Was he someone who was supposed to be nominated? I mean, I think you could have said that he was definitely in the conversation. But the thing that happened with Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series is the studio. The only person who wasn't in the studio that got nominated in this category is Jon Bernthal for The Bear, which you could also say is expected.

5:20just from the for your consideration event itself where like they present the show in front of Emmy voters they did a whole panel of guest actors and so Brian Cranston who's nominated Dave Franco who's nominated Ron Howard who's nominated all were on that panel so that was kind of expected but this is Ron Howard's first ever acting nomination despite Happy Days the Andy Griffith show. And so this was like a real long time coming, but also Anthony Mackie, who stars in the Ron Howard movie with Dave Franco within the studio. What is it? Alphabet City. All three of them got nominated. So now I feel like Apple kind of has to make Alphabet City.

6:04Ryan Lattanzio:Hopefully not have it be three hours or whatever it is, but like a self-indulgent finale that's about Ron Howard's childhood. I know, but Martin Scorsese also. So I think that's completely deserved. That is the best part of the premiere. You think that's deserved? He's in it for like two minutes and he's just playing himself. That one to me, I was like, okay, like this is not a real recognition for a performance. What's interesting about the studio is it's about movie making, but the TV Academy is very much like the film Academy in that they want to see something that reflects themselves and often in a kind of funhouse mirror form where they can laugh at themselves without having any real reflective self-awareness.

6:43Ryan Lattanzio:So the studio did really well. Catherine O 'Hara is in there, Catherine Hahn. Again, I feel like these people are voting for the actors who they beloved, not necessarily the characters. Those are good comic performances, but those characters are caricatures of Hollywood archetypes, wouldn't you say? Yeah, and I think there is that element of like Hollywood awarding itself, but I think something else that came up this particular TV season, especially after the fires in January is sort of this celebration of shows that shot in Los Angeles and so there's the obvious ones like the studio hacks even nobody wants this but then you get a surprise like Paradise on Hulu and I think part of that is like Dan Fogelman and Sir Owen K.

7:30Brown with This Is Us were like real Emmys players. But they made it a real point during their campaign that like they tried to shoot this show in LA as best as possible. And after the wildfires, that has become such a bragging right for many shows that got nominated this year.

7:51Ryan Lattanzio:Yeah, and meanwhile, there aren't many movies that have that particular bragging right. As much as people are trying to lure production back to LA, it's still very stagnated. And not to veer too far into this topic, but there's got to be some way that the Television Academy is going to embed that into the ceremony, right? There's going to be some, I don't want to say tribute to the fires, but there's going to be some acknowledgement in how the industry, especially in TV, has reacted to it and responded. Yeah, and I think obviously it's not as immediate as the Grammys or the Oscars responding to it.

8:25But I think they have an opportunity to shift the conversation into, like we just said, a call for more productions to come back to L.A. and shoot in L.A. And so I do think that'll be really interesting. Another thing to flag as well is that the TV Academy themselves this year is putting on this TV festival, Televerse, in LA. And so a lot of these shows are coming to LA to kind of present panels on why they should actually win the Emmy instead of just having received the nomination.

8:59Ryan Lattanzio:Is Televerse meant to supplant the now defunct TCA press tour? Like there's a void now that this is kind of filling. Is it functioning in a similar way? I guess that's an interesting point. Yeah. I mean, I could see that a little bit. I think that, I mean, look, marketing budgets are going low. And so not as many studios can kind of do their own like four-year consideration house where like they book a location and do a bunch of panels. And so the TV Academy is kind of providing that service for them in a way that also benefits their bottom line. And so I do think it's like mutually beneficial.

9:39The way it works is when people are trying to get nominations, it's almost like every day a TV show does their event to kind of try and get voters to watch their show and vote for them. And so that doesn't happen when nominations come out. But now with Televerse, the TV Academy is kind of making that happen.

10:02Ryan Lattanzio:And is it also kind of allowing, is it leveling the playing field a bit for the smaller guys to compete with, like Netflix, who kind of does this thing all the time, or Apple that will take over Grand Central Station for severance as it did before that season launched? Only really those big pocketed streamers that seem to have bottomless resources are able to do something like that and go viral. One can only hope, though. I mean, I haven't looked too deeply into the business model of how these panels are coming about. And so we'll see if everyone gets a fair shot. But yeah, I mean, funny enough, like you mentioned that Netflix kind of did a thing where instead of sort of booking one house, they kind of said, we're taking over LA.

10:47And so we're doing events at the Huntington Library or other sort of Los Angeles hotspots, Egyptian theater. So I think it's always funny to see how they spend their marketing budgets.

11:01Ryan Lattanzio:Well, Netflix did really well, even on the level of some more obscure series, but nothing for Squid Game. Completely shut out. What happened there? Is this too familiar? Do we have kind of Squid Game fatigue? We've honored it the last time. I know this is like the part where I feel like I could give the listeners like an image of me at the whiteboard trying to explain this. The way a show like The Bear or Only Murders in the Building campaign for Emmys is they use the new season to kind of show why the old season deserves awards. So even though season four of The Bear just came out and people are probably going to vote for the show as if they're voting for season four, the people on the show are nominated for season three.

11:51And so Liza Colon-Zayas winning last year, that was actually for season two. But all the voters had already seen her main season three episode. It also happened for Evan Moss-Bakarat with season one and season two. All that is to say, I think Squid Game would have done a lot better if the final season had premiered earlier when people were still voting. We would have seen a lot more people from Squid Game get in there. All right.

12:20Ryan Lattanzio:So if we want to move into the limited series category, there is a lot going on in there in terms of people jockeying for the same show. What does it mean that Cooper Koch got in there over Nicholas Alexander Chavez? This has been Monsters, the Lyle and Eric Menendez show on Netflix. Did you watch that one, Marcus? I watched a little bit of it. And I think Cooper was kind of always expected because the fifth episode of the season has been seen as the highlight of the whole show. And that focuses in on his character. But I think it does say something that normally a lot of times the voters will have tunnel vision.

13:00And so some of those surprises that you see with something like The White Lotus, for example, is instead of people from multiple shows being nominated, it's multiple people from one show being nominated. But in the case of Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie, long category title, this year, we saw kind of the expected people and the people who were campaigning, like Brian Tyree Henry for Dope Thief, nominated next to Jake Gyllenhaal for Presumed Innocent, where he didn't campaign very much. but that show was a huge hit last summer it's not like a crazy surprise to see him nominated but if you think about the way like tv viewing works it it says a lot that people kind of still remembered him all these months after i mean i think we're past a year of that show being on the

13:54Ryan Lattanzio:air as far as presumed innocent goes all like all the main actors except for renato renzva and the kids they got in there peter stars guard ruth nega bill camp and obviously jake gyllenhaal that seemed unexpected right that wasn't a critically beloved show a lot of people watched it it was like one of the biggest hits ever for apple i certainly watched it i think i watched it all in one sitting you know what i mean but i don't know that it was as water cooler adjacent as it would have been on like a cable platform for sure and but i do think that like you said week to week has really made a difference for a lot of shows.

14:31That's how you see sort of unexpected things pull numbers. I mean, Netflix is really kind of, well, Netflix limited series tend to be the only exception. I think that adolescence did have that staying power despite all four episodes premiering at once. But that was more like you don't have the biggest star is Stephen Graham. and so I don't think everyone is like flocking to watch it immediately but the people who did watch it get to be like hey if you didn't catch adolescence this weekend you should watch it and that's how the show keeps powering on um but yeah I mean I think that with presumed innocent it wasn't as much campaigning I mean Peter Sarsgaard was out and about but yeah I just really think it's popularity because if you look at some of the other shows that are nominated in the limited series categories they just haven't made as much of a mark i mean even black mirror this season getting into outstanding limited or anthology series i heard like some good stuff about the most recent season but i don't think it's as huge as it once was uh no i i am a big i'm not a big

15:46Ryan Lattanzio:fan of Black Mirror. I just watch all of them. This was the weakest season by far, maybe ever. There was like two good episodes. Just to go back to a Netflix show for a minute with Monsters, that's a show that I thought was almost reversely provocative and became even exploitative in terms of turning this real life murder case into like a gay incest story with lots of nudity. It was really weird and really shady are we gonna hear much from these actors again i mean they're by now they are like immortalized and really associated as playing these two guys cooper koch is going to be in this luca guadagnino movie that we'll talk about in a minute what about nick chavez i know tough break i also just read that he got cut from i know what you did last summer that's coming i was wondering about that because i know because i'm seeing that tonight and i was looking at the credits and it was like everyone has a like his name is at the bottom and it doesn't say he was playing so I had a bad feeling about that yeah but he's young so he's he's gonna be in like the ya tv circuit I but I do think Cooper is now as we said in that echelon where he's getting booked for some bigger roles also in this category a show that I didn't watch is the penguin the solemnity of the Matt Reeves Batman movie made it kind of a grueling sit but everyone really likes the show.

17:08Ryan Lattanzio:I guess it's connected to that world, but it's somewhat divorced from it. It's gotten some, I don't want to put it on the level of Sopranos, but when people are pitching that I should watch the show, that's kind of what they describe it as. Here's what I'll say. I put it off forever because when I saw the Batman, it was like 1030 at night. And so I was like nodding out. And so I feel like I never actually got the full experience of the film. And it's like two and a half hours. And so I never felt like I had the time to rewatch it. Finally, I just bit the bullet and watched The Penguin itself. And it really was worth it.

17:47I think that Colin Farrell, despite all the makeup, is giving a really exciting performance about a character that I previously didn't care about. And the real highlight who happened to have her first ever TV role on The Sopranos is Kristen Milioti, who comes in as this even sort of lesser known character and completely transforms it. And their two arcs really are exciting to watch. Like it's a good balance of like action gangster show. It's not crazy deep until kind of superhero action. is more just like heightened in a way that's like crazy sexy cool as an awards editor who

18:31Ryan Lattanzio:works in the emmy space how do you sustain joie de vivre for lack of a better word over long periods of time talking and thinking and writing about the same stories we do it to a degree with the oscars but it's usually it used to be like six months whatever now it's down to like a dainty or something when you go from Cannes to the Oscars. How does that work for the Emmys when it's like, we've been talking about the Penguin for a year. We've been talking about Abbott Elementary for however many years. I mean, something that's crazy is if you go to the documentary category, you look at something like Will and Harper.

19:06Imagine having to promote your film for almost two years through Sundance 2024, all the way through Oscar season. Now they're into Emmy season. And now they're nominated for an Emmy. So that's a run I can't even imagine. But for me, I always simplify it as film is kind of fall winter for me and TV is spring summer. And so by the time Oscar season is over, I'm actually excited to watch these shows as a reprieve from having to watch every single film that comes out in the fall. And same goes for by the time the Emmys are happening. I'm excited to move on to watching every film that I can see because I've had to like binge stuff like monsters as you said all within a day which I mean even when the show is good sometimes it's hard to power through that much tv in one short time yeah well I commend you for um feeling

20:08Ryan Lattanzio:hope after the oscars are over and eagerness to do anything i want to be catatonic and locked in a dark room by myself for like a week another drama that is bidding farewell having its swan song it was the handmaid's tale uh which that they are voting for the last season this this year i don't know that many people that are still watching this show uh it does have its cult of audience. Some people thought maybe Elizabeth Moss would be nominated again here in some form, whether it's directing an episode or starring in it. Why did that get shafted? People are just kind of over that one? Yeah, I think normally in a regular Emmy season, you see a lot more new shows get nominated because voters only have to catch up on one season.

20:54With something like Handmaid's Tale, it's what, seven seasons that this went through? And so there's so many points in the show at which people kind of fell off from it um and so they it's literally one outstanding drama series before and so it's not like emmy voters didn't pay attention to it but yeah this year i think yeah yeah this year its only nomination is outstanding guest actress in a drama series for cherry jones she plays a big character um but also she's someone who is constantly nominated at an outstanding exception hello yeah yeah so it's a mix of that it's like some people watch the show and some people just saw cherry jones on the ballot and

21:41Ryan Lattanzio:were like i love her obviously the last of us still cleaned up with nominations even though this season was there was a decline in ratings there's some disenchantment with um how this season was handled uh with respect to the second video game uh and there's drama too because neil druckman just stepped away from writing the show being on the show altogether for the subsequent seasons um was there anything crucial that the last of us was supposed to get that it didn't i don't think so i mean uh supporting actors like uh gabriel luna or isabel merced uh were sort of in the running, but those categories are where the White Lotus just completely takes over.

22:27And that's kind of what happened, not to the same degree as it usually is. And so I wouldn't feel bad if I were them. I mean, another big surprise is like Allison Janney, who is among the people who have won the most Emmys of all time, didn't get a supporting actress in a drama nomination for The Diplomat despite that show being an outstanding drama series and so I think The Last of Us Pedro getting in is a huge win because he wasn't on the season very much so that's just a testament to how much people love him and for lead actor as well lead actor category yeah he is not a lead in this season I don't he's technically in more than half the episodes of the season that's how you make it in that's the brian cox effect um you put a flashback in or you put a face on a tv screen and you say this is why they deserve the emby um but i think we need one

23:32Ryan Lattanzio:more flashback just two hornet in there to make sure he gets nominated make sure he's in the last two seconds of the episode so we can put it on his imdb the last of us it was super strong in the guest actor categories season one it won for both uh guest actor and guest actress i forget who won guest actor but i know storm reed won for guest actress because she played uh bella ramsay's love interest in the flashback but yeah that's kind of the same thing it got this year i mean you saw jeffrey wright got in there and so did joe panagliano but i think in guest actress in particular it's probably going to win again because caitlin dever is nominated and she they already said is going to be the lead of season three which there wasn't a third video game and so i mean correct me if i'm wrong hopefully there will be one that's what we're all waiting for that's probably what neil needs to work on i think there's another video game that naughty dog is doing but um but yeah i mean that's tricky too when you think of game of thrones and when they diverged from the seasons that had a book to support it and so we'll see but i trust craig mazen uh the hangover part two direct or writer uh craig mazen uh to associate him with to me it's chernobyl guy i think it's incredible that's why you can't count anyone out they always have uh they could always have something uh great to show you and i think the last of us has been really great and so i'm excited to see what's next yeah small joke on pick's behalf uh the one i was going to ask about is megan fahey for sirens she was kind of on the bubble i i watched that entire show like in a day it was like a very in sort of like a days very sad days and i don't remember anything about it or what it was about other than julianne more her character like every time it cut to her there was like a smudging on the lens a kind of air brushing that sort of like that Nicole Kidman will get Julianne Moore got that no one else did including Megan Fahey who was nominated for best actress is that like goodwill that's sort of left over from her White Lotus season two role that's really what put her on the map as far as these people are concerned right no it was that other show are you talking about the bold type yes the bold type which I didn't really watch I mean no I did not watch it but I would since it is about journalism or publishing, I hope to watch it one day.

26:05Oh, yeah, I was joking with a colleague that pretty much every millennial journalist is ready to take a bullet for Megan Fahey because of the bold type. But yeah, in terms of the TV Academy, they didn't watch that show. I don't think they watch Freeform. But it is a little bit leftover of the White Lotus, but a little bit of strategy. I think Netflix kind of knows the power of a drop, and this was a late in the season drop. And so I don't think they were totally expecting the show to make the limited series cut. But I do think they had something strong with Megan, especially since Perfect Couple, which was not as much of a critical success.

26:47That's the one that Nicole Kidman was in. And they did the choreographed dance for each opening. She also starred in that. And so you get this kind of dichotomy between her character in that show, where she's one of the rich people, and her character in Sirens, where she's kind of more audience surrogate in this world full of billionaires.

27:14Ryan Lattanzio:I was hoping there'd be more disclaimer. That show, you know, that dates us back to Venice of last year. Obviously, Cate Blanchett got nominated. That's a no-brainer, but this is a really strong show. I don't know that enough people watched it. I don't really know how it did, but that show – but you think Alfonso Cuaron. Again, maybe he's not a TV Academy icon necessarily in the way where it's like at the Oscars he's a shoo-in for something. Another one, a colleague was asking why Jacob Elordi wasn't nominated for The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Amazon bought that show I mean it already had the show internationally it it bought it for distribution like a couple days uh before the end of April and then just dumped it and obviously did a campaign that show's really fantastic I've been trying to get more people to watch it and Justin Kerzel another great uh film director yes exactly and I've had some issues last year I know with a movie I really didn't like Justin if you're listening I you know I you've reclaimed my my fandom um speaking of venice we're obviously both going to be there at the end of the month for about a week and the lineup is getting announced pretty early next tuesday july 22nd we talked about netflix there's a possibility that they will have four movies that they're not like last year netflix bought maria i and but they didn't come into the festival with something this year they're going to have noah bombach jay kelly okay there's these are the things i'm predicting that are reasonable and based on probability no bomb box movie jay kelly guillermo del torres frankenstein catherine bigelow's house of dynamite and edward berger is the ballad of a small player these are all movies that have been finished for a while uh what uh movies are you hoping to see there i'm actually really excited for the catherine bigelow film i can't totally think of the cast i think greta lee's in it that's reason enough for me to see it love her um and so i but yeah i would say the one i feel like is the most most likely is frankenstein just because guillermo del toro has such a history with the festival but yeah even jay kelly i want to see adam sandler i mean george clooney's like the lead he's probably the jay the titular jay but i'm excited for another adam sandler oscar run yeah well noah Baumbach has had some luck in directing Adam Sandler before.

29:41Ryan Lattanzio:There's been a number of dramatic Adam Sandler performances that we now have been overlooked by the Academy. Not just Uncut Gems, but I would say Unstrong Love, even Funny People, which I think is underrated in terms of a Judd Apatow movie. Maybe it's rated in terms of his fandom. I don't know. To answer your question, though, some of the other people in the Catherine Bigelow movie, Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Lutz, Anthony Rayman, jona howard king monas moses ingram they're all caitlin caitlin dever they're all here they're all in there so excited about that one too a couple other ones that we're thinking are going to be there demona fastfold quaker musical with amanda seyfried and lee that would make sense because brady corbet's movies have all played venice that's his wife obviously her directorial debut The World to Come played the COVID, very underrated movie that got shafted by COVID release.

30:40Ryan Lattanzio:Park Chan-wook's first movie since Decision to Leave that we thought maybe was going to be at Cannes. And it's a kind of reimagining or not a remake, but it's a no, it's an adaptation of a of a book by Don Wesley from the from the 90s called No Other Choice. lazlo nemes the director of son of saul who's done a couple films since then that haven't really popped quite as much as that did because that won the international feature oscar this movie's called orphan that could be there obviously i've talked about the luca guadagnino movie well we know that's going to be there there's no question about that he has a loyalty to that festival same with begonia that's the yorgos length oh yeah that'll be there too no question what else am i overlooking i feel like those are the movie you've mentioned a ton we know is going to be there father mother sister you're listening wow like oh no i'm super excited because as i was saying last week summer blockbuster season is tough if you're looking for um stimulation i would say or looking for a challenge and uh i'm feeling on we right now and i definitely need to be reinvigorated by something new and that something new will then become something old that by January I won't want to talk about anymore but I still will be because we won't be at the Oscars yet yeah I think the one big thing is like they keep saying that it's probably not going to be there but I think it would be crazy if they don't bring one battle after another uh the Paul Thomas Anderson movie to Venice just because even with sort of the not so critically acclaimed movies like obviously Joker 2 was kind of a disaster but Warner Brothers said Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice.