Emmy Noms Look "Desperate"

The women of Wisteria Lane--or, most of them anyway--should be feeling a little less desperate after being shown the love of 15 Emmy nominations Thursday.

Desperate Housewives, TV's most watched new series of the 2004-05 season, now becomes TV's most nominated series in the race for the 57th Annual Primetime Emmys. It is a title shared with NBC's Will & Grace, which despite declining ratings scored nods for all of its stars (save Debra Messing), and several of its game stunt-casting participants. Only the HBO made-for-TV movies, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers and Warm Springs, hoarded more nominations--16 each--as the award-show field was announced at a predawn press conference in North Hollywood, California.

Though not short on drama, ABC's suburbia-skewering Housewives is competing as a comedy. As such, stars Marcia Cross, Teri Hatcher and Felicity Huffman will vie for Lead Comedy Series Actress honors against Everybody Loves Raymond's Patricia Heaton, a past winner, and Malcolm in the Middle's Jane Kaczmarek, a six-time nominee.

Absent from the lineup: Eva Longoria. As at the Golden Globes, Longoria was the only Desperate Housewives leading lady not to bag a nomination. Come the fall, she'll sit on the sidelines with Nicollette Sheridan, a Supporting Actress nominee at the Globes but a fellow snubee at the Emmys.

Having better luck than Longoria and Sheridan: The retired Everybody Loves Raymond, going out in style with 13 nominations; ABC's Lost, last season's other It Show, finding 12 nominations, including ones for supporting castaways Naveen Andrews and Terry O'Quinn; and HBO, winning network bragging rights with a league-leading 93 nominations.

As a series, Housewives has a berth in the Best Comedy race alongside defending champ Arrested Development. The other contenders: Everybody Loves Raymond; Will & Grace; and Scrubs, the first time the Nielsen-challenged comedy has made the cut.

o Complete list of contenders

In the race for Lead Actor in a Drama Series race,Hugh Laurie breaks through with a nomination for dispensing bad bedside manner in House. Huff's Hank Azaria, Deadwood's Ian McShane, Boston Legal's James Spader, and 24's Kiefer Sutherland are his competition. Only Spader, the reigning winner, and Sutherland are holdovers from last year.

Though new shows and new stars were the order of the day, House couldn't crack the Best Drama Series field--nor could Grey's Anatomy, TV's other big new medical hit. Lost was the lone freshman series to make the cut. It's joined by Six Feet Under, 24, The West Wing and Deadwood, the other category newcomer. MIAs include: The Sopranos, which didn't have any new episodes for Emmy voters to judge; and, CSI, which did, but didn't get a nomination here anyway.

Patricia Arquette earns her first ever Emmy nod, registering in the Lead Actress in a Drama Series category. Medium's medium will test her powers against veteran nominees Glenn Close (The Shield), Frances Conroy (Six Feet Under), Jennifer Garner (Alias) and Mariska Hargitay (Law & Order: SVU).

TOP CONTENDERS
Show
Nominations
The Life and Death of Peter Sellers
16
Warm Springs
16
Desperate Housewives
15
Will & Grace
15
Everybody Loves Raymond
13
Lost
12

Monk's Tony Shalhoub is the last 2004 nominee standing in the Lead Comedy Series Actor race. Slots filled last year by Larry David, Kelsey Grammer, Matt LeBlanc and the late John Ritter have been taken over by Jason Bateman (Arrested Development), Zach Braff (Scrubs), Eric McCormack (Will & Grace) and Ray Romano (Everybody Loves Raymond).

"It's very exciting," Jason Bateman told E! shortly after his nomination was announced. Currently at work on a big-screen comedy with Braff, Bateman joked that he's "probably going to elect not to talk" to his opposition.

In the battle of the reality competition shows, it'll be The Amazing Race seeking to continue its somewhat-amazing winning streak against American Idol, The Apprentice, Survivor and Project Runway.

If the votes are with them, Garner and new husband Ben Affleck will have matching mantle pieces. While she's up for Alias, he and Oscar pal Matt Damon are up for a Reality Program Emmy for Project Greenlight. Their show's competition: Antiques Roadshow, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, Penn & Teller: Bulls--t! and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

In the battle of the HBO TV movies, Lackawanna Blues, executive produced by double-Emmy nominee Halle Berry (she's also nominated as a Lead Actress in a Miniseries or Movie for Their Eyes Were Watching God), The Life and Death of Peter Sellers and Warm Springs will try to fend off BBC America's The Office Special and TNT's The Wool Cap for Best TV Movie honors.

While viewers were mostly cruel to CBS' Elvis miniseries, Emmy voters elevated it to the Outstanding Miniseries category opposite Empire Falls, The 4400 and The Lost Prince.

Jon Stewart was all over the variety categories, picking up nominations for Best Writing, Best Show and Best Host--all for The Daily Show. Saturday Night Live was the anti-Jon Stewart, shut out in all but one technical category.

David Letterman and Jay Leno traded snubs. Letterman's Late Show is up for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series, along with The Daily Show, Real Time with Bill Maher, Late Night with Conan O'Brien and Da Ali G Show--and Leno's Tonight Show isn't. Leno, meanwhile, is up for Best Host, along with Stewart, Hugh Jackman (for the 58th Annual Tony Awards), Tracey Ullman (for an HBO special) and Whoopi Goldberg (ditto)--and Letterman isn't.

Minus fresh episodes of Chappelle's Show--the last new one aired in May 2004--Dave Chappelle could have been minus Emmy nominations, but his Showtime special, Dave Chappelle: For What It's Worth, came through in the Best Variety Special category. His far-flung competition: the 77th Annual Academy Awards; the 58th Annual Tony Awards; NBC's coverage of the opening ceremonies of the Summer Olympics; and the Everybody Loves Raymond retrospective, The Last Laugh. Other nomination notables:

According to the early line from the gaming site, BetWWTS.com, Teri Hatcher is first among all Desperate Housewives in the Best Lead Comedy Series Actress field. Her show is down as the best bet for Comedy Series; and, although unconventional shows tend not to fare so well come Emmy night, Lost is pegged as the lead horse in the Drama Series race.
Buzz show Entourage popped up on the Emmy radar with three nods, the highest-profile of which went to super-agent man Jeremy Piven, up for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series.
In its first season, Friends scored nine nominations. In its first season, Friends spinoff Joey scored zero nominations.
Whatever happened to Debra Winger? She just scored her first-ever Emmy nomination--Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or TV movie for Dawn Anna.
Whatever happened to that kid from A Christmas Story? Peter Billingsley grew up to be an Emmy nominee for co-executive producing the Outstanding Nonfiction Series hopeful, Dinner for Five.
Once an Emmy king, ER scored just three nominations, including ones for guest stars Red Buttons and Ray Liotta. And while The West Wing came through with a Best Drama Series nomination, it managed only four others--none for its lead actors. (Alan Alda and Stockard Channing, however, were represented in the supporting categories.)
Denis Leary didn't get an acting nomination for his fire-fighting series, Rescue Me, but he did get a writing nomination for helping pen the pilot.
Quentin Tarantino won his Oscar for writing, not directing, but he can win an Emmy for helming the season finale of CSI. Rivals include former thirtysomething star Peter Horton, up for directing an episode of Grey's Anatomy.
Desperate Housewives nominees come in all genders, as male Danny Elfman, nominated for composing the main title theme, can attest.
Michael Bolton is back, and Emmy's got him. The crooner is in the game for penning the music and lyrics to "The Tears of the Angels," a song from the Lifetime documentary, Terror at Home: Domestic Violence in America.
Blythe Danner is Emmy's triple-threat. She's nominated as Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or TV Movie for Back When We Were Grownups, as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for Huff, and as Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for Will & Grace.
As previously noted, the guest-star-happy Will & Grace owes much of its Emmy success to the Guest Actor categories. One-third of its nominations was for one-shot performances by Danner, Victor Garber, Jeff Goldblum, Bobby Cannavale and Alec Baldwin.
With a Drama Series Guest Actress nod for Law & Order: SVU, Angela Lansbury can now either win and break her Emmy losing streak, or lose and tie Susan Lucci for Emmy futility. (Lucci burned through 18 nominations without a single win, before finally claiming a Daytime Emmy in 1999.)
Longtime marrieds Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward scored his-and-her nominations. His was for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or TV-movie; hers was for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or TV movie--both were for their work in HBO's Empire Falls. To date, Newman is a two-time Emmy loser; Woodward is a three-time Emmy winner.
Woodward's competition is about as considerable as it gets: Oscar winners Charlize Theron (The Life and Death of Peter Sellers) and Kathy Bates (Warm Springs), and Emmy-winners Jane Alexander (Warm Springs) and Camryn Manheim (Elvis). Ossie Davis, who died in February, earns a posthumous nomination for his guest appearances on The L Word. He has three previous nods, but no previous wins.

CBS is scheduled to air the 57th annual Primetime Emmy Awards on Sept. 18 from Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium. No word yet on a host.