Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large The decision to realign “variety talk” and “variety sketch” this year into “talk” and “scripted variety” didn’t do much to change that.
If anything, it further narrowed the field, as perennial variety talk winner “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” has now been kicked over to scripted variety.
As a result, my colleague Clayton Davis counts only 14 series eligible for the outstanding talk nomination. And it’s not much better in scripted variety, where just 10 shows appear to be eligible.
The realignment ultimately didn’t do anything other than pit perennial winners “Last Week Tonight” and “Saturday Night Live” in the same category.
Read more on variety.com