The leading television awards are due to be announced this weekend at a grand ceremony in Los Angeles. The big question is: How diverse will the slate of winners be?
Actors Rege-Jean Page, MJ Rodriguez, Michaela Coel and Bowen Yang
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Last year, the Emmys were held exclusively online and celebrities had to give the customary red carpet and camera flashes a miss. This year, TV stars will meet in Los Angeles on September 19, in person but with strict hygiene regulations amid the COVID pandemic.
Organized by the International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, a non-profit based in New York, the Emmys are considered the most important awards in television. Together with the Oscars, the Tonys and the Grammys, the Emmys are considered one of the four major prizes in the US entertainment industry. This year, the awards will be held for the 73rd time.
The first Emmys were awarded in 1949 and a lot has happened since then. Most of all, in the last two or three years, movements like #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter have shaken up the American entertainment industry and forced it to deal with issues regarding the representation of the country's diversity ― in front of and behind the camera. But have things changed?
Spike Lee, iconic filmmaker
The US film director, who leads the Cannes Film Festival jury, is a renowned advocate for African-American rights, but has directed a wide variety of films.
Spike Lee, the president of Cannes' 2021 jury, is such an iconic director that the film festival included his depiction on the event's official poster. The festival organizers said they dedicated it to Lee "for that curious look he is going to put on the work of his fellow filmmakers."
Nicknamed "Spike" as a child, Shelton Jackson Lee was born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1957. His mother was a teacher of arts and Black literature and his father was a jazz musician and composer. The family moved to Brooklyn, New York, when Spike was a young child, and the city would play a central role in many of his films, including in his first student film, "Last Hustle in Brooklyn" (1979).
Image: Getty Images/P. Le Segretain
Doing the right thing
Spike Lee starred in his own game-changing work, "Do the Right Thing," as pizza delivery man Mookie. The 1989 film about the rise of racial tensions remains relevant three decades after its release; it climaxes with a white policeman killing the character Radio Raheem in a chokehold — reflecting ongoing police violence affecting African Americans, protested by the Black Lives Matter movement.
The director, who often acts in his own films, gave many aspiring young African-American actors the chance to build a film career. Denzel Washington, seen above with Lee in the 1990 drama film "Mo' Better Blues," went on to become a top Hollywood star.
Image: picture alliance/kpa
Breaking stereotypes
"Jungle Fever" in 1991 also starred actors little known back then, but who are well established today: Wesley Snipes and Halle Berry, the latter with whom Lee had a relationship at the time. The film is about sexual attraction and an interracial relationship.
Image: picture alliance/United Archives
Epic take on a legendary civil rights leader
A year later, Lee's most costly film at the time was released. "Malcolm X" was a summary of everything the director felt was important. Denzel Washington plays the title role in the biopic about the life of the African-American activist, from his troubled childhood and conversion to Islam to his assassination in 1965.
Image: picture alliance/United Archives
Semi-autobiographical
A school teacher, a jazz musician and a bunch of kids — the 1994 film "Crooklyn" is about a family in New York in the 1970s, and clearly has numerous autobiographical elements. The memory of growing up in Brooklyn makes for a humorous and vibrant film.
Image: picture alliance/United Archives/IFTN
A hard life
The 1995 film "Clockers" takes on issues that have always moved Spike Lee: life and survival in neighborhoods riddled with drugs and crime and rocked by ethnic strife. It starred Harvey Keitel, Mekhi Phifer and John Torturro.
Just a year later, the film "Girl 6" tells the story of an aspiring actress who makes a living working for a telephone sex hotline. Short cameo appearances by Quentin Tarantino, Madonna and Naomi Campbell underline Lee's popularity.
Image: picture alliance/United Archives
Bronx lynch mobs
Lee focused on another topic of choice in the 1999 film "Summer of Sam," namely the crime scene in New York and conflicts between different gangs. The film, starring Adrien Brody and John Leguizamo, looks at the effect a real 1977 serial murder case had on a fictional group of people in the Bronx.
Image: picture alliance/United Archives
The spirit of a wounded city
In "25th Hour," Edward Norton plays a drug dealer who has 24 hours before he goes to jail for seven years — a melancholy look at the transience of life and musings about what is really important. Based on David Benioff's novel, the film happened to be shot shortly before the 9/11 attacks, and was reworked afterward, turning it into a cult tribute to New York City — and one of Lee's best films.
Image: picture alliance/United Archives
Bank heist
The 2006 thriller "Inside Man" is proof that Spike Lee is also a master of commercial film. The movie about a bank robbery is entertaining, but also addresses issues close to the director's heart.
Image: picture alliance/kpa
Shift to documentaries
After "Inside Man," Spike Lee turned to documentaries, advertising films and music videos. Released in 2016, "Off the Wall" is the story of Michael Jackson's early years, before he rose to international stardom.
Image: picture-alliance/AP/MJJ Productions
'No peace, no pussy'
"Chi-Raq" is a musical drama about gang crime and racism, with women leading a sex strike to get their husbands to stop gang violence in Chicago. The director based his story on the classic drama "Lysistrata" by ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. It celebrated its premiere at the Berlin Film Festival in 2016.
Image: Parrish Lewis
A first competitive Oscar
In "BlacKkKlansman," two police agents, one Jewish and one Black, penetrate the Klu Klux Klan. Spike Lee's 2018 satire is based on a true story from the 1970s — but also references current racial tensions in the US. It won the Grand Prix at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, as well as the Oscar for best adapted screenplay, making it Lee's first competitive Academy Award after an honorary one in 2015.
Image: D. Lee/F. Features
Powerful comments on racism
Four African American veterans return to Vietnam years after the war, searching for the remains of their squad leader. Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" was released on Netflix in June 2020, as massive protests against police brutality and racism in the US were unfolding. He also released at the time a short film, "3 Brothers," directly commenting on how history keeps repeating itself.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/D. Lee
Iconic style
The director is also renowned for his strong sense of fashion. He's shown here at the 2019 Oscars, wearing two knuckle rings that belong to film history: Emblazoned with the words "hate" and "love," the rings were worn by Radio Raheem in Lee's "Do the Right Thing." Raheem's speech about love and hate in the film was also a tribute to the influential thriller "The Night of the Hunter" (1955).
Image: AFP/F. Harrison
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More representation
While the Academy Awards struggled with #OscarsSoWhite criticism for a long time, the annual Emmys proved to be more inclusive. This was probably due to the fact that a number of television series, many of which were produced by streaming giants Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon, are more diverse. Even last year, the Emmys sent a signal for more diverse representation, according to the Hollywood Diversity Report 2021.
Many BiPoc (Black, indigenous and people of color) celebrities as well as LGBTQ actors have won prominent Emmy Awards. The Television Academy has, in the name of inclusion, undertaken many changes in its nomination process.
Emmy nominations over the years
Far from the goal
However, there is criticism that the reforms don't go far enough. Last year, not one Latinx (a gender-neutral term for people of South American origin) person was nominated. BiPoCs were also not adequately represented among the award-winners.
Voices of protest spoke up soon enough: John Leguizamo, who won the Emmy for Outstanding Performance in a Variety or Music Program in 1999 for Freak, criticized the awards on Yahoo!Entertainment, saying, "It's unbelievable that our stories aren't being told and there's one reason for that… Executives don't see us, don't get us — don't care about us."
The actor said that the group is the largest minority in the US and contributing $1.3 trillion (€1.1 trillion) to the US economy.
"We just need to have somebody, you know, give us the pat on the back and represent us correctly," he said, calling the discrimination of Latinx people "cultural apartheid."
In a statement to the Los Angeles Times, the Television Academy wrote that it was a positive sign that performers of color had increased from 1 in 10 to 1 in 3 nominees across all performer categories. But the members agreed that "clearly that increase in representation has not been equal for all groups, and clearly there is still more to do to improve both gender and racial representation across all categories."
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Nominations 2021
In the meantime, many players in the film and television industry are focusing on diversity. While BIPoC actors were hardly represented in the last 10 to 20 years, this year looks different. Around 44% of nominees in the acting categories are BIPoCs.
This year, the Television Academy nominated a transwoman for the first time. MJ Rodriguez has been nominated in the lead actress in a drama category for her role in Pose, a series set amid New York City's drag ball culture during the 1980s and 1990s. Categories like best director and screenplay are, however, still dominated by white artists.
Diversity in German TV
A lot of progress has been made in the German film and television landscape as well.
"I have noticed that something is changing, but at a small scale," says German actor Denise M'Baye, who is of German, Senegalese, Dutch and Indonesian heritage.
"An example: Lorna Ishema [a German actor who was born in Uganda] was nominated for the film Ivie wie Ivie [German for "Ivie, as in Ivie"] at the German film prize. That's a big thing and in the Black film-making community there was a huge applause for this nomination. The fact that we're so happy about it shows that it is an exception and how it's something out of the ordinary even today," she told DW.
German actor Denise M'BayeImage: Peter Steffen/dpa/picture alliance
M'Baye played novice Lela in the German TV series Um Himmels Willen [For God's sake] and has contributed hugely to establishing actors of color in German television.
"I have noticed this year that the roles I am offered, even the names sound German. These roles could have been played by blonde actresses. I notice therefore that a change is taking place. And I hope that it does not remain at the surface and is not done just to fulfil quotas, but that we understand that it makes sense to represent this diverse society, this multi-faceted Germany," M'Baye says.
She pleads for more inclusion among editors, screenwriters, authors and directors.
"When we start at the end, at the awards ceremony and at that point, wish for more inclusion, then we have the screenplay at the beginning," M'Baye says. "The question is, who decides. Unfortunately, it is always the case that marginalized groups and people of color are still underrepresented. We need more inclusion at all levels to represent our society, which is diverse."
