July 15, 2025 • 21 mins
Variety's Michael Schneider and Clayton Davis discuss the surprises and the final tallies for the 77th annual Emmy Award nominations. Owen Gleiberman, Variety's chief film critic, revisits Robert Altman's "Nashville" on its 50th anniversary and recalls how the movie changed his life.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, strictly business listeners. This is your host Cynthia Littleton.
I'm so excited today to give you a sneak listen
to a podcast project we've been working on for a
few months, Daily Variety. On this show, we talked to
Variety journalists and guests about news, personalities and trends that
are making headlines and showbiz. Variety has the most incredible
(00:21):
masthead of journalists covering media and entertainment. In addition to
our strength in La, New York and London. Almost every
day of the year, Variety is somewhere in the world
covering a festival, or a market or a premier. We
want to showcase all this great work in a new
way with this program. Of course, we'd love to hear
your feedback at Variety dot com. Thanks for checking us out,
(00:44):
and away we go. Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily
dose of news and analysis for entertainment industry insiders. Yes,
it's Tuesday, July fifteenth, twenty twenty five. I'm your host,
Cynthia Littleton. I am co editor in chief of Variety
(01:07):
alongside Ramin Setuta. I'm in LA. He's in New York,
and Variety has reporters around the world covering the business
of entertainment. Today is no ordinary day. It's Emmy Nominations Day.
The contenders for the seventy seventh annual Emmy Kudos were
unveiled this morning.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Good morning everyone, Thank you for joining us for the
seventy seventh Emmy Award nominations announcements. We are up right
and early to celebrate the standout work of the past year.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
HBO Max leads the field among platforms by a wide
margin with one hundred and forty two bids. Casey, Blois
and Coe pulled out a new personal best thanks to
the heft of the Penguin, The White Lotus, The Last
of Us, and Hacks. Apple TV Plus drama Severance was
the most nominated program overall, with twenty seven Apple TV
(01:57):
Plus leaders Zach van Amberg and Amy Erlicht. We're probably
toasting with kool aid, as Apple also had the most
nominated comedy this year with its buzzy freshman show The Studio.
In today's episode, we'll hear from TV editor Michael Schneider
and Chief Awards Editor Clayton Davis on the Emmy nominations,
What made sense, what didn't, and what was a pure
(02:20):
surprise to these expert prognosticators. We'll also talk about what
an Emmy means to a platform as a business proposition
these days. After that, we'll take a ninety degree turn
to a discussion of the fiftieth anniversary of a movie
that had enormous influence on pretty much everything that came
after it, Robert Altman's epic Nashville. It changed the life
(02:45):
of Variety chief film critic Owen Gleiberman. He'll explain how
other than the Emmy nominations, here are a few things
from this morning that you need to know. Fox News
is the latest TV network to court podcast talent. The
channel has cut a deal to distribute the current events
podcast Ruthless, that is hosted by four GOP insiders. Certainly,
(03:07):
after this deal, you'll probably be seeing more of Josh Holmes,
Michael Duncan, John Ashbrook, and the host who goes by
the pseudonym Comfortably Smug on Fox News very soon. As
something of interest for fans of early early Fleetwood Mac,
the song catalog of co founder Peter Green has been
(03:27):
sold to Primary Wave Music for an undisclosed fee. Green's
notable tunes include black Magic Woman, Yes, although Carlos Santana
made it famous, Fleetwood Mac was the first to record
that spooky song in nineteen sixty eight. Now it's time
for conversations with variety journalists about what's making news and showbiz.
(03:51):
Let's get right into the Emmy conversation with Clayton Davis
and Michael Schneider. Michael Schneider, Clayton Davis, thanks for joining me.
It's been a lot day for you already. Happy Emmy
Day to those who celebrate. And you know who's really
celebrating is one Casey Bloys who Cynthia's you know, I
had a chance to talk to this morning, and needless
(04:13):
say he is over the moon. With their one hundred
and forty two nominations a best ever for HBO and
HBO Max pretty astounding. And you know, you look at
just these shows, the sheer strength of the penguin, the
Last of Us, the White Lotus hacks the pit. It's
(04:34):
it's you know, they spread that wealth around.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
Clayton.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Of course you are famous. Everybody knows you for your predictions.
So tell me how to excore yourself.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
How you feel in this morning?
Speaker 4 (04:45):
I actually feeling really really well, like in some areas.
It was pretty business as usual. Comedy series went exactly
the way we thought. Limited series went exactly the way
I thought a lot of the some of the acting races,
there were a lot of great stuff there. I mean,
HBO flexed more than I've ever seen them flex. And
I think if you especially look pound for pound by
(05:05):
how many series were nominated overall, Penguin was across the board.
White Lotus did exactly what it did last time with
twenty three nominations. But then a lot of shows that
never got any love before the rehearsal somebody somewhere like
they all did really well. That was, like, you know,
some of the real surprising things.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Severances atop the leader board with twenty seven nominations. Did
that twenty seven tally? For Severn's surprise you.
Speaker 4 (05:33):
Yes, it did, considering that the first season got fourteen
and it took so long to come back, the fact
that it came soaring back the way it has, I mean,
it's really going to show some muscle there. And then
it's one challenger is the Pit got thirteen nominations, which
sounds like not like a lot, but it's a show
(05:54):
that doesn't have a score doesn't have special effects. It's
one set the whole time, so production design and cinematography
aren't exactly like you know on on on the docket, Poard.
But those two are really going to be a great
epic battle that I can't wait to see play out.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
Mike, what what other thoughts? Are there any nominations that
stood out to you as things that just came out
of nowhere.
Speaker 5 (06:17):
I'll throw a couple things out at you that shocked me.
I think he was the fact that Squid Games did
not get a single nomination, you know, from a show
that in season one did huge. But you know, beyond that,
you know, shout out to Apple TV plus because you know,
obviously they dominated in both drama and comedy, with the
two most nominated shows in Severance and the Studio. One
(06:41):
of the most interesting thing is Jimmy Kimmel was dominated
four times, but for four different things. For his show,
of course, you can't get enough Jimmy for hosting Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire? He's had four different nominations
this year, which was pretty interesting.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Clayton, on a much more serious note, you are a
chronicler of how how the different awards bodies do on
the issue of diversity and inclusion. Clayton, what do you
think today's tally tells us about this year? And I'd
also like to ask you for more of a longer
you know, like the five year sweep since you joined us.
Speaker 4 (07:18):
Yeah, so since twenty twenty I got here, they had
their least amount of actors of color recognized in the
last five years. So it's twenty.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Four this year.
Speaker 4 (07:27):
For this year, twenty four out of ninety four available slots,
we're occupied by people of color about twenty five percent.
Twenty twenty two is a record year for them, which
was forty two. I always come into these conversations to say,
it's easy to blame the TV Academy, the Film Academy,
Roscar so White, Emmy so White, and we can there
(07:50):
are some responsibility upon the voters to watch as much
as they can. However, they are a reflection of the industry,
and in this time where we see a three percent
drop and submissions from last year, which last year had
a six percent drop from the year before, and deeis
constantly under attack at the moment. But even with that said,
(08:12):
twenty four out of space it really looked bulkier than
I had anticipated, because I thought we were going to
be in like the nineteen range. So twenty four actor
was better than I anticipated in.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
Terms of number. You're not talking about numbers.
Speaker 4 (08:27):
Yeah, I was encouraged by that, but we still we
have some work to do, and there's some great strides there. Certainly,
Ky Brown is now tied with Don Cheatle. You know,
his seventh show that he's been nominated for some most
ever by a black man, tied with Don Cheatle. That
that that's incredible.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
He's definitely Emmy bait going into Emmy bate category.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
Quince is the third most nominated black woman ever in
her category. Like, you know, we have the most women
of color nominated supporting actress comedy for the second time
after two years ago. So we're making tries. It just
we want them every year.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Let me close out by asking also, you know, on
a serious note, the Emmys have always, for seventy seven years,
have been a form of bragging rights for the television business.
But it does seem like the value of an Emmy
has become more crystallized at this end of time in
the industry, when it's harder to say I'm the number
one show in the country because people aren't watching the
(09:25):
way they used to, Mike, why are they fighting so
hard to get these these What do these do for
them as a business?
Speaker 5 (09:31):
Yeah, I mean I think here you you hit it
in the streaming age, where you know, these streamers are
constantly dealing with chur and they really have to sell
themselves to the public on their value proposition. And what
better value proposition than telling your customer that we have
the best programming, we have quality programming, and here's proof,
(09:52):
we are the most Emmy nominated, we have the critically
acclaim shows. It really matters now as a business proposition,
and for these companies in the way that it didn't
back in the broadcast days, where you really were more
focused on advertising and other means and ratings. We're different
kinds of currency now. That currency is about convincing people
(10:16):
to spend their money to subscribe to your service, and
HBO started that, you know, back in the nineties, and
eventually that was adopted by the streamers as well, and
now that's a real big part of their business. So
the whole awards game and obviously admittedly self serving in
this aspect, but it's the last remaining measurement that consumers
(10:38):
can understand. Nielsen ratings are are not really like the
way they used to mean or translate to consumer Viva
la Emmy's.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
Thank you both so much for taking the time. It's
been a busy day and it's not over yet. Deeply appreciated.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
Nice too. Here we go.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
From scoping future award winners, now we look back fifty
years at Robert Altman's landmark of American Cinema, Nashville. My
colleague Owen Gleiberman, Variety's chief film critic, pens a powerful
column in this week's print edition of Variety about the
impact the movie had on him as a college freshman.
(11:20):
Once I proofed that page last week, I knew Owen
had to come on and share that story with Daily Variety.
Owen Gleiberman, Variety's chief film critic, thanks so much for
joining me.
Speaker 3 (11:31):
Nice to be here, Cynthia Owen.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
You wrote a column that will be published in this
week's print edition of Variety. You wrote a column that
was so moving, so touching, so personal. You talked about
the movie Nashville, Robert Altman's epic Story of America that
was released in June of nineteen seventy five, and your
column really takes us back to that moment in time,
(11:55):
both for the country and for where you were. You
write so movingly about what this movie meant to you.
Tell me what it was like for you to write
that column and take yourself back to that place.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
Well, it was kind of cathartic. Actually, Nashville is my
number one all time favorite movie. And it's not a
movie I chose to be in that place. It chose me.
It had an effect on me unlike any other film
I'd ever seen. I saw it when I was a
freshman in college college Film Society the year after it
came out. Actually, I went to the University of Michigan.
(12:30):
This a crowded place in with twenty thousand other kids.
You're trying to find out who you are, trying to
find your niche. My niche was that I was a
film geek. So I was going to all these movies,
and then in December, first semester, I saw Nashville and
it literally blew me away and blew my head open
the way that nothing ever had. I'd never seen a
(12:51):
movie that mirrored life the way that Nashville did. It
seemed to be literally, these twenty four characters wandering around
the country, music capital, stars, fans, politicians, hangers on. It
seemed as rich and full as the life off screen,
and the movie as a result, possessed me. It kind
(13:15):
of took over my imagination. I thought about nothing else
for six months, and it was almost like a religious
experience before and after Nashville.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Who among the cast members really stood out to you?
Speaker 3 (13:29):
The funny thing is it's the kind of movie where
every actor in it becomes your favorite actor when they're
on screen because you just love them all and they
all seem so real and so human. But there are
some that stand out. Lily Tomlin as this gospel singer
who's married to a celebrity lawyer and has an affair
(13:49):
with Keith Charrodine's country singer. Keith Garrotine as that singer
just capturing that kind of moody narcissism of a mid
seventies rock star like I've never seen. And Ronnie Blakely
as a character kind of modeled on Loretta Lynn but
doing her own thing with it.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
So you're in college and you are studying this movie.
How did this religious experience lead you to your career today?
Speaker 3 (14:17):
Well, I became so obsessed with Nashville that I literally
wanted to write about it. And they had a Robert
Altman Festival the next semester, coincidentally, and I decided to
cover that for my school newspaper, and that kind of
got me into writing. But more than that, I wanted
to figure out what it was about this movie that
had so moved me. In the middle of the nineteen seventies,
(14:39):
America really had become this kind of lost and broken place.
I mean, we'd broken away from the middle class ideals
of the fifties. The whole dream of the counterculture had
sort of fallen apart. This was post Vietnam, post Watergate.
What did we believe in anymore? And what Nashvill showed
(15:00):
me is it showed me what the country was, and
it showed me that as flawed and has kind of
lost a place, and as it had become, it was
still a place that you could fall in love with,
because you kind of fell in love with all the
characters in this movie, and it showed you that there
was something about what it was to be in America
(15:23):
that you loved. It was a kind of freedom. There
was a feeling of American freedom somehow right in the
DNA of the movie.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Owen, did you ever meet Altman? Did you ever tell
him of his incredible influence on your career?
Speaker 3 (15:37):
I did finally get to meet Altman. I think by
that point I was probably passed gushing about Nashville, because
I met him in the late eighties. I had lunch
with him at a hotel in Boston when he was
doing a publicity tour for one of his films, Streamers, and.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
He was not in a good mood.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
He had a real dissent after that. The movies he
made in the second half of the seventies were not good,
and he kind of fell out of popularity and was
in the wilderness for a while. It really was not
until nineteen ninety two when he made The Player, which
is another truly great film.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
A landmark movie, and the reason why Seth Rogan's character
in The Studio is named Griffin Mill. It is a
total nod to The Player.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Absolutely. The Studio, which I love, is very much son
of the Player, and knows that The Player was just
a visionary film.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
But Hollywood, it's quite a legacy for an auteur who
left us in two thousand and six. At the age
of eighty one.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
When Alman died, a movie theater in my neighborhood decided
to program a number of his films in tribute. I
went to see Nashville. I hadn't seen it in a
lot of years, and I wanted to know would it
hold up. It did. But more than that, something hit
me with a really surprising force of revelation, which is
at seeing this film in the middle two thousands, its
(16:57):
meaning had changed to me. What I saw was that
Altman in nineteen seventy five had foreseen the Internet age,
and by that the whole metaphysic of what we talk
about when we talk about how the Web changed everything
and how we're all in our own little worlds, our
own little niches. That the fragmentation of America was really
(17:21):
accomplished by the Internet. Altman foresaw all that quality. That's
actually what Nashville is about.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Well, Owen, I've really enjoyed chatting with you about this,
but once again, your writing in this column is so beautiful.
I thought it would be great if you would end
by reading us a couple passages, and folks, do not
miss it. Go get your print edition of Write on
Wednesday look Forward on Variety dot Com on Wednesday, Owen,
please take it away.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
This section is just about how Nashville kind of captured
the nineteen seventies. I was a teenager in the nineteen
seventies and eurro that's romanticized now, and for good reason.
There was a lot of freedom, a lot of passion,
a lot of great music, a lot of pinball. But
there was a weird spiritual waywardness to that time. As
(18:09):
a culture, we no longer believed in the suburban dream
of the fifties, We no longer believed in the hippie
dream of the sixties. The moon Landing was a sci
fi dream that within five minutes came to feel like
a rerun. The era was full of fake religions, est
alien visitors, Lou Reed's solo albums, and as each of
(18:29):
these things kind of let you down, you were left
with a haunting question was there anything left that united America?
I think that is a lot of what Nashville is about.
Let me just finish with a passage in my column
that talks about what is probably my favorite scene in
the history of motion pictures. I don't think it's too
(18:51):
much of a stretch to say that Alman in nineteen
seventy five foresaw the Internet age as well as the
era were in now and America fraction splintered, adam mines balkanized,
separated from itself. What Nashville shows us is the great
American crack up. Yet, when Ronnie Blakely as the country
(19:12):
star Barbara Jean gets up on stage at the Opry
bell to seeing tape deck in his tractor and dunes,
it's one of the most transcendent sequences in the history
of cinema. For a few heartbreakingly blissful moments, the down
home incandescence of her performance seems to pull the world
of America together, giving us all a desperate reason to believe.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
As we close out today's episode, here are a few
things we're watching out for. The SP's and Variety Sports
and Entertainment Breakfast will be held Wednesday night and Thursday morning, respectively.
One cool thing they have in common this year is
honoring Alex Morgan, the pioneering soccer player, for her work
to promote pay equity and women's sports. I can't wait
(20:01):
to talk to her and her business partner Dan Leavy
that full interview will be featured on this week's Strictly
Business podcast, which will be out on Friday. Thursday also
brings Netflix's first quarter earnings report. We'll get a curtain
raiser on tomorrow's Daily Variety on what to expect from
Variety Business writer Jennifer Moz before we go. Congrats to
(20:24):
three executives at Warner Brothers Games who have been promoted
from studio heads to senior vice presidents. Eve La Chance
oversees Harry Potter and Game of Thrones Games. Sean Himmerick
is the main man for Mortal Kombat and DC Studios Games,
and Stephen Flennery steers All Tech and Central Services. Thanks
for listening. This episode of Daily Variety was written and
(20:46):
reported by me Cynthia Littleton, with contributions from Clayton Davis,
Michael Schneider, and Owen Gleiberman. It was edited by Aaron Greenwald.
Stick's next hick Picks. Please leave us a review at
the podcast platform of your choice, and please tune in
tomorrow for another episode of Daily Variety
Hello, strictly business listeners. This is your host Cynthia Littleton.
I'm so excited today to give you a sneak listen
to a podcast project we've been working on for a
few months, Daily Variety. On this show, we talked to
Variety journalists and guests about news, personalities and trends that
are making headlines and showbiz. Variety has the most incredible
(00:21):
masthead of journalists covering media and entertainment. In addition to
our strength in La, New York and London. Almost every
day of the year, Variety is somewhere in the world
covering a festival, or a market or a premier. We
want to showcase all this great work in a new
way with this program. Of course, we'd love to hear
your feedback at Variety dot com. Thanks for checking us out,
(00:44):
and away we go. Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily
dose of news and analysis for entertainment industry insiders. Yes,
it's Tuesday, July fifteenth, twenty twenty five. I'm your host,
Cynthia Littleton. I am co editor in chief of Variety
(01:07):
alongside Ramin Setuta. I'm in LA. He's in New York,
and Variety has reporters around the world covering the business
of entertainment. Today is no ordinary day. It's Emmy Nominations Day.
The contenders for the seventy seventh annual Emmy Kudos were
unveiled this morning.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Good morning everyone, Thank you for joining us for the
seventy seventh Emmy Award nominations announcements. We are up right
and early to celebrate the standout work of the past year.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
HBO Max leads the field among platforms by a wide
margin with one hundred and forty two bids. Casey, Blois
and Coe pulled out a new personal best thanks to
the heft of the Penguin, The White Lotus, The Last
of Us, and Hacks. Apple TV Plus drama Severance was
the most nominated program overall, with twenty seven Apple TV
(01:57):
Plus leaders Zach van Amberg and Amy Erlicht. We're probably
toasting with kool aid, as Apple also had the most
nominated comedy this year with its buzzy freshman show The Studio.
In today's episode, we'll hear from TV editor Michael Schneider
and Chief Awards Editor Clayton Davis on the Emmy nominations,
What made sense, what didn't, and what was a pure
(02:20):
surprise to these expert prognosticators. We'll also talk about what
an Emmy means to a platform as a business proposition
these days. After that, we'll take a ninety degree turn
to a discussion of the fiftieth anniversary of a movie
that had enormous influence on pretty much everything that came
after it, Robert Altman's epic Nashville. It changed the life
(02:45):
of Variety chief film critic Owen Gleiberman. He'll explain how
other than the Emmy nominations, here are a few things
from this morning that you need to know. Fox News
is the latest TV network to court podcast talent. The
channel has cut a deal to distribute the current events
podcast Ruthless, that is hosted by four GOP insiders. Certainly,
(03:07):
after this deal, you'll probably be seeing more of Josh Holmes,
Michael Duncan, John Ashbrook, and the host who goes by
the pseudonym Comfortably Smug on Fox News very soon. As
something of interest for fans of early early Fleetwood Mac,
the song catalog of co founder Peter Green has been
(03:27):
sold to Primary Wave Music for an undisclosed fee. Green's
notable tunes include black Magic Woman, Yes, although Carlos Santana
made it famous, Fleetwood Mac was the first to record
that spooky song in nineteen sixty eight. Now it's time
for conversations with variety journalists about what's making news and showbiz.
(03:51):
Let's get right into the Emmy conversation with Clayton Davis
and Michael Schneider. Michael Schneider, Clayton Davis, thanks for joining me.
It's been a lot day for you already. Happy Emmy
Day to those who celebrate. And you know who's really
celebrating is one Casey Bloys who Cynthia's you know, I
had a chance to talk to this morning, and needless
(04:13):
say he is over the moon. With their one hundred
and forty two nominations a best ever for HBO and
HBO Max pretty astounding. And you know, you look at
just these shows, the sheer strength of the penguin, the
Last of Us, the White Lotus hacks the pit. It's
(04:34):
it's you know, they spread that wealth around.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
Clayton.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Of course you are famous. Everybody knows you for your predictions.
So tell me how to excore yourself.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
How you feel in this morning?
Speaker 4 (04:45):
I actually feeling really really well, like in some areas.
It was pretty business as usual. Comedy series went exactly
the way we thought. Limited series went exactly the way
I thought a lot of the some of the acting races,
there were a lot of great stuff there. I mean,
HBO flexed more than I've ever seen them flex. And
I think if you especially look pound for pound by
(05:05):
how many series were nominated overall, Penguin was across the board.
White Lotus did exactly what it did last time with
twenty three nominations. But then a lot of shows that
never got any love before the rehearsal somebody somewhere like
they all did really well. That was, like, you know,
some of the real surprising things.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Severances atop the leader board with twenty seven nominations. Did
that twenty seven tally? For Severn's surprise you.
Speaker 4 (05:33):
Yes, it did, considering that the first season got fourteen
and it took so long to come back, the fact
that it came soaring back the way it has, I mean,
it's really going to show some muscle there. And then
it's one challenger is the Pit got thirteen nominations, which
sounds like not like a lot, but it's a show
(05:54):
that doesn't have a score doesn't have special effects. It's
one set the whole time, so production design and cinematography
aren't exactly like you know on on on the docket, Poard.
But those two are really going to be a great
epic battle that I can't wait to see play out.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
Mike, what what other thoughts? Are there any nominations that
stood out to you as things that just came out
of nowhere.
Speaker 5 (06:17):
I'll throw a couple things out at you that shocked me.
I think he was the fact that Squid Games did
not get a single nomination, you know, from a show
that in season one did huge. But you know, beyond that,
you know, shout out to Apple TV plus because you know,
obviously they dominated in both drama and comedy, with the
two most nominated shows in Severance and the Studio. One
(06:41):
of the most interesting thing is Jimmy Kimmel was dominated
four times, but for four different things. For his show,
of course, you can't get enough Jimmy for hosting Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire? He's had four different nominations
this year, which was pretty interesting.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Clayton, on a much more serious note, you are a
chronicler of how how the different awards bodies do on
the issue of diversity and inclusion. Clayton, what do you
think today's tally tells us about this year? And I'd
also like to ask you for more of a longer
you know, like the five year sweep since you joined us.
Speaker 4 (07:18):
Yeah, so since twenty twenty I got here, they had
their least amount of actors of color recognized in the
last five years. So it's twenty.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Four this year.
Speaker 4 (07:27):
For this year, twenty four out of ninety four available slots,
we're occupied by people of color about twenty five percent.
Twenty twenty two is a record year for them, which
was forty two. I always come into these conversations to say,
it's easy to blame the TV Academy, the Film Academy,
Roscar so White, Emmy so White, and we can there
(07:50):
are some responsibility upon the voters to watch as much
as they can. However, they are a reflection of the industry,
and in this time where we see a three percent
drop and submissions from last year, which last year had
a six percent drop from the year before, and deeis
constantly under attack at the moment. But even with that said,
(08:12):
twenty four out of space it really looked bulkier than
I had anticipated, because I thought we were going to
be in like the nineteen range. So twenty four actor
was better than I anticipated in.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
Terms of number. You're not talking about numbers.
Speaker 4 (08:27):
Yeah, I was encouraged by that, but we still we
have some work to do, and there's some great strides there. Certainly,
Ky Brown is now tied with Don Cheatle. You know,
his seventh show that he's been nominated for some most
ever by a black man, tied with Don Cheatle. That
that that's incredible.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
He's definitely Emmy bait going into Emmy bate category.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
Quince is the third most nominated black woman ever in
her category. Like, you know, we have the most women
of color nominated supporting actress comedy for the second time
after two years ago. So we're making tries. It just
we want them every year.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Let me close out by asking also, you know, on
a serious note, the Emmys have always, for seventy seven years,
have been a form of bragging rights for the television business.
But it does seem like the value of an Emmy
has become more crystallized at this end of time in
the industry, when it's harder to say I'm the number
one show in the country because people aren't watching the
(09:25):
way they used to, Mike, why are they fighting so
hard to get these these What do these do for
them as a business?
Speaker 5 (09:31):
Yeah, I mean I think here you you hit it
in the streaming age, where you know, these streamers are
constantly dealing with chur and they really have to sell
themselves to the public on their value proposition. And what
better value proposition than telling your customer that we have
the best programming, we have quality programming, and here's proof,
(09:52):
we are the most Emmy nominated, we have the critically
acclaim shows. It really matters now as a business proposition,
and for these companies in the way that it didn't
back in the broadcast days, where you really were more
focused on advertising and other means and ratings. We're different
kinds of currency now. That currency is about convincing people
(10:16):
to spend their money to subscribe to your service, and
HBO started that, you know, back in the nineties, and
eventually that was adopted by the streamers as well, and
now that's a real big part of their business. So
the whole awards game and obviously admittedly self serving in
this aspect, but it's the last remaining measurement that consumers
(10:38):
can understand. Nielsen ratings are are not really like the
way they used to mean or translate to consumer Viva
la Emmy's.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
Thank you both so much for taking the time. It's
been a busy day and it's not over yet. Deeply appreciated.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
Nice too. Here we go.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
From scoping future award winners, now we look back fifty
years at Robert Altman's landmark of American Cinema, Nashville. My
colleague Owen Gleiberman, Variety's chief film critic, pens a powerful
column in this week's print edition of Variety about the
impact the movie had on him as a college freshman.
(11:20):
Once I proofed that page last week, I knew Owen
had to come on and share that story with Daily Variety.
Owen Gleiberman, Variety's chief film critic, thanks so much for
joining me.
Speaker 3 (11:31):
Nice to be here, Cynthia Owen.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
You wrote a column that will be published in this
week's print edition of Variety. You wrote a column that
was so moving, so touching, so personal. You talked about
the movie Nashville, Robert Altman's epic Story of America that
was released in June of nineteen seventy five, and your
column really takes us back to that moment in time,
(11:55):
both for the country and for where you were. You
write so movingly about what this movie meant to you.
Tell me what it was like for you to write
that column and take yourself back to that place.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
Well, it was kind of cathartic. Actually, Nashville is my
number one all time favorite movie. And it's not a
movie I chose to be in that place. It chose me.
It had an effect on me unlike any other film
I'd ever seen. I saw it when I was a
freshman in college college Film Society the year after it
came out. Actually, I went to the University of Michigan.
(12:30):
This a crowded place in with twenty thousand other kids.
You're trying to find out who you are, trying to
find your niche. My niche was that I was a
film geek. So I was going to all these movies,
and then in December, first semester, I saw Nashville and
it literally blew me away and blew my head open
the way that nothing ever had. I'd never seen a
(12:51):
movie that mirrored life the way that Nashville did. It
seemed to be literally, these twenty four characters wandering around
the country, music capital, stars, fans, politicians, hangers on. It
seemed as rich and full as the life off screen,
and the movie as a result, possessed me. It kind
(13:15):
of took over my imagination. I thought about nothing else
for six months, and it was almost like a religious
experience before and after Nashville.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Who among the cast members really stood out to you?
Speaker 3 (13:29):
The funny thing is it's the kind of movie where
every actor in it becomes your favorite actor when they're
on screen because you just love them all and they
all seem so real and so human. But there are
some that stand out. Lily Tomlin as this gospel singer
who's married to a celebrity lawyer and has an affair
(13:49):
with Keith Charrodine's country singer. Keith Garrotine as that singer
just capturing that kind of moody narcissism of a mid
seventies rock star like I've never seen. And Ronnie Blakely
as a character kind of modeled on Loretta Lynn but
doing her own thing with it.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
So you're in college and you are studying this movie.
How did this religious experience lead you to your career today?
Speaker 3 (14:17):
Well, I became so obsessed with Nashville that I literally
wanted to write about it. And they had a Robert
Altman Festival the next semester, coincidentally, and I decided to
cover that for my school newspaper, and that kind of
got me into writing. But more than that, I wanted
to figure out what it was about this movie that
had so moved me. In the middle of the nineteen seventies,
(14:39):
America really had become this kind of lost and broken place.
I mean, we'd broken away from the middle class ideals
of the fifties. The whole dream of the counterculture had
sort of fallen apart. This was post Vietnam, post Watergate.
What did we believe in anymore? And what Nashvill showed
(15:00):
me is it showed me what the country was, and
it showed me that as flawed and has kind of
lost a place, and as it had become, it was
still a place that you could fall in love with,
because you kind of fell in love with all the
characters in this movie, and it showed you that there
was something about what it was to be in America
(15:23):
that you loved. It was a kind of freedom. There
was a feeling of American freedom somehow right in the
DNA of the movie.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Owen, did you ever meet Altman? Did you ever tell
him of his incredible influence on your career?
Speaker 3 (15:37):
I did finally get to meet Altman. I think by
that point I was probably passed gushing about Nashville, because
I met him in the late eighties. I had lunch
with him at a hotel in Boston when he was
doing a publicity tour for one of his films, Streamers, and.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
He was not in a good mood.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
He had a real dissent after that. The movies he
made in the second half of the seventies were not good,
and he kind of fell out of popularity and was
in the wilderness for a while. It really was not
until nineteen ninety two when he made The Player, which
is another truly great film.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
A landmark movie, and the reason why Seth Rogan's character
in The Studio is named Griffin Mill. It is a
total nod to The Player.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Absolutely. The Studio, which I love, is very much son
of the Player, and knows that The Player was just
a visionary film.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
But Hollywood, it's quite a legacy for an auteur who
left us in two thousand and six. At the age
of eighty one.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
When Alman died, a movie theater in my neighborhood decided
to program a number of his films in tribute. I
went to see Nashville. I hadn't seen it in a
lot of years, and I wanted to know would it
hold up. It did. But more than that, something hit
me with a really surprising force of revelation, which is
at seeing this film in the middle two thousands, its
(16:57):
meaning had changed to me. What I saw was that
Altman in nineteen seventy five had foreseen the Internet age,
and by that the whole metaphysic of what we talk
about when we talk about how the Web changed everything
and how we're all in our own little worlds, our
own little niches. That the fragmentation of America was really
(17:21):
accomplished by the Internet. Altman foresaw all that quality. That's
actually what Nashville is about.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Well, Owen, I've really enjoyed chatting with you about this,
but once again, your writing in this column is so beautiful.
I thought it would be great if you would end
by reading us a couple passages, and folks, do not
miss it. Go get your print edition of Write on
Wednesday look Forward on Variety dot Com on Wednesday, Owen,
please take it away.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
This section is just about how Nashville kind of captured
the nineteen seventies. I was a teenager in the nineteen
seventies and eurro that's romanticized now, and for good reason.
There was a lot of freedom, a lot of passion,
a lot of great music, a lot of pinball. But
there was a weird spiritual waywardness to that time. As
(18:09):
a culture, we no longer believed in the suburban dream
of the fifties, We no longer believed in the hippie
dream of the sixties. The moon Landing was a sci
fi dream that within five minutes came to feel like
a rerun. The era was full of fake religions, est
alien visitors, Lou Reed's solo albums, and as each of
(18:29):
these things kind of let you down, you were left
with a haunting question was there anything left that united America?
I think that is a lot of what Nashville is about.
Let me just finish with a passage in my column
that talks about what is probably my favorite scene in
the history of motion pictures. I don't think it's too
(18:51):
much of a stretch to say that Alman in nineteen
seventy five foresaw the Internet age as well as the
era were in now and America fraction splintered, adam mines balkanized,
separated from itself. What Nashville shows us is the great
American crack up. Yet, when Ronnie Blakely as the country
(19:12):
star Barbara Jean gets up on stage at the Opry
bell to seeing tape deck in his tractor and dunes,
it's one of the most transcendent sequences in the history
of cinema. For a few heartbreakingly blissful moments, the down
home incandescence of her performance seems to pull the world
of America together, giving us all a desperate reason to believe.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
As we close out today's episode, here are a few
things we're watching out for. The SP's and Variety Sports
and Entertainment Breakfast will be held Wednesday night and Thursday morning, respectively.
One cool thing they have in common this year is
honoring Alex Morgan, the pioneering soccer player, for her work
to promote pay equity and women's sports. I can't wait
(20:01):
to talk to her and her business partner Dan Leavy
that full interview will be featured on this week's Strictly
Business podcast, which will be out on Friday. Thursday also
brings Netflix's first quarter earnings report. We'll get a curtain
raiser on tomorrow's Daily Variety on what to expect from
Variety Business writer Jennifer Moz before we go. Congrats to
(20:24):
three executives at Warner Brothers Games who have been promoted
from studio heads to senior vice presidents. Eve La Chance
oversees Harry Potter and Game of Thrones Games. Sean Himmerick
is the main man for Mortal Kombat and DC Studios Games,
and Stephen Flennery steers All Tech and Central Services. Thanks
for listening. This episode of Daily Variety was written and
(20:46):
reported by me Cynthia Littleton, with contributions from Clayton Davis,
Michael Schneider, and Owen Gleiberman. It was edited by Aaron Greenwald.
Stick's next hick Picks. Please leave us a review at
the podcast platform of your choice, and please tune in
tomorrow for another episode of Daily Variety
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