Despite (or maybe even because of) the tough times Hollywood is struggling right now (everything from the devastating Palled and Eaton fire fires to Large, expensive mergers that causes massive layoffs) seems networks to be more difficult than ever for their Emmys.
During the period before the official vote started, each night brought another show presented for TV Academy Members in places that included everywhere from the Los Angeles Lakers Training Facility to Beyoncés Cowboy Carter Tour Stop at Sofi Stadium and Academy Museum of Motion Pictures several times over. After Emmy nominations? It’s been more of a free for everyone.
TV Academy’s introductory Televerse FestivalAnd all the events that surround it, offered a more centralized evidence soil, all that developed the weekend before the official vote started. TeleverDuring the first year, participants gave a better idea of which show will win and, more generally, was TV The industry itself stands.
Below, IndieWire takes a temperature on the Emmys race in 2025 which enters the vote and shares the highlights and the low points in what we saw at the big event.
Televerse had the right vision
Television Academy can breathe easier to know that the first reaction to Televerse is not all bad, despite some shocks on the road that we will dive into below.
There is much to say about an event that made it possible for the participants to run from a workshop about Breaking Story with “Andor” Season 2 Author Beau Willimonto a panel conversation on new TV adjustments, to the “Rupaul’s Drag Race” nominated panel with a LIPSYNC Lalaparuza Smackdown with Queens from season 17All back-to-back and step away from each other inside JW Marriott near La Live.
Although it is miles away from where much of the FYC events usually occur, so easy to go to room (with snacks at the door!) Convinced enough people that the festival has potential.
While workshops were predictably popular (one with Henry Winkler was among the first telecommunications events sold out), the series was of panels that saw a lot of commitment from participants, which was a mix of people involved in the TV Academy, the public who bought tickets and press, the panels on artificial intelligence.
More fascinating? The width of ideas shown in these panels. Something that “The Legal Future of AI on TV” had a more positive lean on new technology, while “Performers & AI – Contracts, Consental & Compensation” felt more like a call for action to mitigate AI’s effect on the industry. It showed that the TV Academy at least had the finger on the pulse for what the industry discusses and discusses.
… especially with TV Academy Hall of Fame
The TV Academy Hall of Fame The ceremony is far from a new event, but has long had trouble capturing as an annual event since, even before the Covid-19 pandemic. Its latest iteration, which served as the closing event for the three-day telecom festival, was impressive enough to strengthen it as the TV Academy’s response to Governor awards.
First, it was similarly participants who happen to be on the campaign track, such as current Emmy nominated Uzo Aduba (“The Residence”), Jeff Hiller (“Someone somewhere”) and Sheryl Lee Ralph and Janelle James (“Abbott Elementary”). But the acceptance speeches were also engaging enough to be cut within Primetime Emmys Telecast.
Actress Viola Davis got the audience to hang on to her every word and told them: “The whole career has been a party going on inside me, and that party has maintained me, has healed me.” Composer Mike Post devoted his speech to his collaborators, including the late Pete Carpenter.
The TV mogul Ryan Murphy was mostly stuck in gratitude for his FX colleagues, with Disney President Dana Walden as the one who handed him the Induction Award, although his clip package presented Never-Fore-Sen-Sneak-Peeks at the new season of his currently “Net-nominated Netfi-Nettf About Ed Gein. He also referred to actress Sarah Paulson, in the audience, for whom he has written 15 characters, and emphasized how he has created and written over 250 gay characters, 300 women over 40 characters, over a thousand trans characters and 10 straight male characters called Brad.
Although he was not present as originally planned, comedians Adam Sandler introduced Honoree Henry Winkler through the video message, where he shared how the Emmy winner who played his father in “Click” helped him manage his father in reality. It was gripping to the next award to the late Live Event Director Don Mischer is accepted by his widow Suzan and their children.
Finally, the latest Oscar values and the current Emmy -nominated Conan O’Brien Levity brought back to the event and joked about its central Los Angeles place, in a bales probably only a floor above where Quinceañeras is worth. In addition, he showed support for his colleague Soon-to-be the former late night host Stephen Colbertto say that he is “too talented and too essential to disappear” and will “shine brighter than ever in a new format that he controls completely”, in reaction to his comrades Fallout with paramount.
But it had not desired attendance
To O’Brien’s Point, to get voters to LA Live, more a sports and concert pavilion with expensive public parking, can be a big issue.
When it comes to nominated panels, some shows could draw what seemed to be sold out crowds, but the average panel was at best half full, thus not too many official event photos containing the audience. Some show that initially planned panels switched to just screen a section, and the panels that occurred struggled to fill the hour -long time gap on them.
The “shrinking” panel even got Boos from the audience for finishing about 30 minutes early, until it became clear that it was because star Harrison Ford was exhausted from all trips to be in LA for the event (he got stuck for another 10 minutes). HBO was the only network that had two programs that share an hour’s long time slot, so the nominated panels could be tighter.
In the end, a place where the TV Academy is based in North Hollywood would probably help with the event’s presence, as well as a more robust activation floor, related to a convention. Although there were some screens in the lounge (and a VR head set), there was not much for the participants to do on site except to go to panels, and the voters actually had a limit to how many they could participate for free.
“The Pitt” and “The Studio” wins the festival
While we did not hear too much buzz about the competition competition program and limited or anthological series, IndieWire heard from several participants the “studio” and the “Pitt” panels were by far the most popular nominated panels at the festival.
It is not so surprising, as the “studio” leads the comedic geese in Emmy nominations. But “The Pitt” detail is particularly revealing, as beginner HBO Max here has less than half of the nominations that the perceived Drama Frontrunner “Severance” has. And that audience is one who woke up early to get there, when the “Pitt” panel started at 10 am on Saturday.
The “Paradise” panel, the Hulu series, which is the second beginner to earn an outstanding nomination of drama series, which happened earlier this week, also had a nice turnout. One theory is that both “Pitt” and “Paradise” are already working on their other seasons and can therefore provide fresher insights in the series than other nominees that often have many years long gaps between seasons broadcast (eg “Andor”, “Severance”, “The Last of Us”).
It is almost as if the return to a more traditional annual television edition is now an advantage for some nominees.
But “severance” wins the weekend
All that said, Televerse was just an event in a packed weekend schedule for the crew “severance pay”. Dan Erickson-created Apple TV+ Hit Manusing Producer and Director Ben Stiller Do A Live Podcast Taping by Josh Horowitz’s Happy sad confused Podcast (together with “The Studio” creator/star Seth Rogen,) A Live “Severrance” podcast tape with Bly Adam Scott and several role members, and even had unique supporting actors “in a drama series nominated tramell to his” seveRance ” -cucumber again, “Severance” Season 2 final.
Other shows did cool events, from “Andor” with a zine signing to HBO with their own day with panels the day after Televerse, but this award season, “Severance” seems to be the most at the top of organizing events and moments that get voters who not only participate, without without speakingWhich makes it difficult to calculate the sci-fi thriller series as a serious Emmys challenger across the line.
