Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large The 44th Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards kicked off the first of two nights on Wednesday in New York, with CNN, Vice and the New York Times as among the big winners.
CNN led the news portion of the Emmys, with ten wins — followed closely by Vice, with nine, and then the NYT with five. Vice’s wins were bittersweet: Eight of them were for the now-canceled groundbreaking program “Vice News Tonight.” CBS’ “Sunday Morning” won for recorded news program, while ABC’s “World News Tonight with David Muir” was named outstanding live news program. “It’s been a tough summer for our industry,” said NATAS CEO Adam Sharp. “We’re encouraged by the breakthrough in the writers’ strike and hope equitable progress in the SAG-AFTRA strike isn’t far behind.
The future of our industry depends on finding an equilibrium between the need for business models to continue adapting to changing viewer habits and the need to ensure that the individual creative and technical talents that are the engine of our industry remain able to make a meaningful and lasting living in it.” CNN news anchor Wolf Blitzer and Oscar-winning director/producer Barbara Kopple were this year’s recipients of lifetime achievement honors, with Blitzer receiving his honor at the news ceremony on Wednesday, while Kopple’s Emmy will be presented at the documentary ceremony on Thursday.
At the Wednesday ceremony, a portrait of Wolf Blitzer drawn by his CNN colleague Jake Tapper was auctioned off. Among major individual winners, CNN’s Selina Wang was named outstanding emerging journalist, while Univision’s Jorge Ramos won the award for journalist in Spanish language media First-time winners on Wednesday included Scripps News (formerly.
Read more on variety.com