Sunday marks the 69th Primetime Emmy Awards, which means that the Television Academy’s 22,000 voters have submitted their picks for the year’s top shows. The Academy has caught a lot of criticism in recent years about the kinds of shows and artists it tends to recognize, and has made an effort to fix its image by hiring the first Black CEO in its 70-year history, and working to diversify its voting pool. So when the Hollywood Reporter ran one anonymous voter’s scorecard Wednesday morning, readers were more than a little surprised by what they saw.
The unnamed voter shared his thoughts with the magazine voluntarily, writing a blurb about how he voted in categories like drama series, comedy series, and variety talk series. He has plenty of opinions about current TV (he’s never liked House of Cards, and This Is Us had him “in tears”), but readers quickly picked up on one common thread in his taste: dude seems to really prefer shows about straight, white, cis dudes.
#Emmys voter reveals brutally honest ballot: 'Westworld' is "pretentious bullshit," #ThisIsUs had me "in tears" https://t.co/ei7l51jlmk pic.twitter.com/oHEutzIIOt
— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) September 13, 2017
In nominating Silicon Valley for his comedy pick, the voter outlines his problems with the other shows in the category—many of which happen to feature groundbreaking, diverse voices.
Atlanta, helmed by Donald Glover and featuring a nearly all-Black cast is “not funny,” the voter is sad to report. Don’t get him wrong, “it’s very creative” and he’s “a big Donald Glover fan… but it isn’t funny, at least to an old white guy like [him].”
The voter enjoys Master of None, Netflix‘s series from Aziz Ansari and Alan Yang, “more in theory than [he does] in practice.” Why? “It’s just a little too preachy and sanctimonious.”
He says the same of Black-ish: “It’s funny, but I always feel like I’m being scolded and educated, and while I don’t mind John Oliver educating me about obscure things, I don’t need that from a network comedy. It just got a little too up its own ass this year.”
You get the idea. In other categories, he states series like Project Runway or RuPaul’s Drag Race are “a little too female, a little too gay for me.” He circles back with, “they’re fine, but not for me.”
The scorecard has done little to comfort TV fans online, who seem to share less passion for American Ninja Warrior than the voter might.
“Never seen a better argument for more diversity on voting orgs than this interview,” David Chen tweeted.
https://twitter.com/davechensky/status/908012909136986112
“In which so many Bad Takes are crammed into one piece that it’s almost impressive the Reporter actually published it,” wrote another user.
In which so many Bad Takes are crammed into one piece that it's almost impressive @THR actually published it. https://t.co/pCYqKUHGUb
— Nate Goodman (@N8goodman) September 13, 2017
This "brutally honest Emmy voter" interview is a fascinating study in oblivious white-male grievance. https://t.co/t6JAu2Mane
— Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) September 13, 2017
This Anonymous Emmy Voter piece is super depressing. https://t.co/1imJRpBxtZ
— Da7e Gonzales (@Da7e) September 13, 2017
The Primetime Emmy Awards air Sunday at 8 pm.