Watch out for ‘The Gilded Age’ cast at the SAG Awards
“The Gilded Age” features one of the most impressive, award-winning ensembles on television, a fact that makes the HBO drama series seem tailor-made for recognition by the Screen Actors Guild Awards in their Drama Ensemble category. The first season — which aired in early 2022 — failed to gain much awards traction, though, getting snubbed by the acting guild entirely. But after a popular second season and on the heels of a third-season renewal, could it sneak into the lineup for the top SAG TV honor? See below for four reasons why it could earn a surprise nomination.
SAG voters love to nominate incredibly large casts
Some of the most memorable winners in the SAG Ensemble categories have been for big casts, such as the three dozens or so performers who went on stage to claim the comedy ensemble prize for “Orange Is the New Black” or the nearly 30 members of the cast of “Boardwalk Empire.” Indeed, voters often seem to love to recognize huge ensemble series in these categories. “The Gilded Age” would fit right into that trend, as the series regular cast for Season 2 includes 24 actors.
Those performers, in order of their credits, are Carrie Coon, Morgan Spector, Louisa Jacobson, Denée Benton, Taissa Farmiga, Harry Richardson, Blake Ritson, Simon Jones, Jack Gilpin, Ben Ahlers, Michael Cerveris, Kelley Curran, Sullivan Jones, Celia Keenan-Bolger, Debra Monk, Donna Murphy, Kristine Nielsen, Kelli O’Hara, Taylor Richardson, Douglas Sills, John Douglas Thompson, Erin Wilhelmi, with Cynthia Nixon and Christine Baranski. This list doesn’t include recurring stars who appeared in more than half of the eight-episode second season and who would thus be eligible to be included in a SAG ensemble nomination, such as Ashlie Atkinson, Robert Sean Leonard, Audra McDonald, Nathan Lane and Jeremy Shamos.
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The cast includes SAG-winning talent
Though the ensemble boasts a lot of fresh faces — this is Jacobson’s first major screen role, for example — it has some incredible, SAG-tested pros at its center. Baranski has eight nominations with the acting guild to her name, including three for “Cybill,” three for “The Good Wife” and two for films “The Birdcage” and “Chicago.” She’s won three, one in Comedy Actress for “Cybill” and two as a member of those film ensembles. Nixon has six nominations, which include two wins for Comedy Ensemble for “Sex and the City.” If some of those recurring actors are deemed eligible, then the tally goes even higher: Lane has two noms for “Birdcage” in film ensemble and Male Supporting Actor, Leonard has one bid as an ensemble member of “House,” and McDonald has one nomination for “Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill.”
Voters have historically loved HBO
HBO has dominated the Drama Ensemble category at the SAG Awards. The network has racked up 31 nominations in this category over the past three decades, which is more than any other network or streamer; NBC comes in second with two dozen noms. It hasn’t struggled to reap more than one nomination in the category in any given year, either, as HBO has scored two ensemble bids in the same year eight times, at the 2002, 2003, 2005, 2007, 2012, 2014, 2017 and 2020 ceremonies.
While that would seem to bode well for a series like “The Gilded Age,” HBO has never once earned three nominations in a single year. Since “Succession” and “The Last of Us” are the top two contenders in our current combined odds in Drama Ensemble, it may be incredibly difficult to sneak in that third bid for “The Gilded Age,” no matter how impressive the cast might be.
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Voters loved its “cousin” series “Downton Abbey”
No, “The Gilded Age” has no direct ties to “Downton Abbey” except for creator Julian Fellowes and some of its behind-the-scenes talent like director Michael Engler, but it does share an incredibly similar style and sensibility as a period costume drama with delightfully low stakes. “Downton” was a favorite of SAG voters, earning five consecutive nominations in the ensemble category in ceremony years 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 and winning in 2013 and 2015. There hasn’t been a series quite as similar to “Downton” on television until “The Gilded Age” came along, so perhaps those fans will “come home” to recognize another lavishly-designed, well-acted show.
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