Think Emmy Categories Are Confusing Now? Here’s How Two TV Academy Experiments in the ’60s and ’70s Went ‘Super’ Awry
variety.comMichael Schneider Variety Editor at Large At 98, Dick Van Dyke is nearly a quarter century older than the Emmys (which clock in at 76 this year).
That’s why it’s all the more astounding that he’s still a force when it comes to TV’s biggest prize. Not only did he score a Daytime Emmy this year, breaking records as that honor’s oldest winner ever, but he was the subject of the current Emmy-nominated CBS special “Dick Van Dyke 98 Years of Magic.” Van Dyke, who last won a Primetime Emmy in 1977 (for “Van Dyke and Company”), isn’t up for one of the four nominations that “98 Years of Magic” received — including outstanding pre-recorded variety special— though his star power sure didn’t hurt.
Van Dyke has won four Emmys overall, but one of them comes with an interesting asterisk. As an armchair quarterback, I know I’m always pontificating on ways the Television Academy could improve the Emmy categories or telecast.
But sometimes, radical change isn’t such a good idea. I’m referring to what happened in 1965, when then-leader Rod Serling pushed the idea to replace the traditional categories with just four major ones: “program achievements in entertainment,” which honored four shows among 15 nominees; as well as three “individual achievement” categories with multiple awards for actors and performers, directors and writers.
Read more on variety.com