The 2023 Emmy Awards have been postponed from September to 15 January 2024 due to ongoing strikes by Hollywood writers and actors, the Television Academy and broadcaster Fox announced on Thursday. This marks the first time the ceremony has been delayed since 2001, when the 9/11 attacks pushed it to November.
Nominations for the 75th Primetime Emmy Awards were announced last month, with Succession, The Last of Us, The White Lotus and Ted Lasso leading the pack. The announcement came just 48 hours before actors joined writers on picket lines after talks with studios broke down. The Creative Arts Emmy Awards have also been rescheduled to 6 and 7 January.
The four-month delay reflects the lack of imminent resolution between the Writers Guild of America (WGA), actors' union Sag-Aftra, and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). Key issues include residual payments based on viewership, minimum staffing levels, and protections against artificial intelligence.
An unnamed studio executive told Deadline last month: 'The endgame is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses.' The Disney CEO, Bob Iger, who earns over $70,000 a day, faced criticism for calling the strikes 'very disturbing' and the unions' expectations 'not realistic'.
More than a dozen A-list actors, including Dwayne Johnson, Meryl Streep, Leonardo DiCaprio and Nicole Kidman, have donated a combined $15m to Sag-Aftra's emergency hardship fund. Sag-Aftra Foundation president Courtney B Vance said they are seeing 'more than 30 times our usual number of applications for emergency aid'.
