Canadians in the hunt for weekend Emmys

TORONTO — The fate of many of this year’s Canadian Emmy nominees has already been decided going into Sunday’s big show on CTV and CBS, but there are still plenty of reasons to wave the Maple Leaf.

The Creative Arts Emmys in Los Angeles last weekend handed out awards in most of the categories in which Canucks were nominated, with James Cameron among the early winners.

Here are a few things to know about homegrown talent at the 73rd Emmy Awards:

THE SETTING:

Sunday’s show was originally set as an indoor affair but moved outdoors in August because of concerns over COVID-19. The limited audience will gather on the Event Deck at the L.A. Live entertainment complex, behind the Microsoft Theater in downtown Los Angeles, where the Creative Arts Emmys were held. It’s a much more personable affair than last year’s largely virtual event, in which awards presenters wore tuxedo hazmat suits and handed out hardware at the winners’ homes.

THE STARS:

Canadians set to appear in the telecast include Reservation Dogs stars D’Pharaoh Woon-ATai, Devery Jacobs and Paulina Alexis as presenters. Schitt’s Creek, which swept last year’s Emmys comedy categories with seven wins, will be represented with stars Dan Levy, Eugene Levy, Annie Murphy and Catherine O’Hara. Comedy star Seth Rogen is also slated to appear in the show, hosted by comic Cedric the Entertainer.

THE CONTENDERS:

Those in the running for hardware Sunday include Lorne Michaels, Toronto-bred creator of Saturday Night Live. He’s up for best writing for a variety series, on a team that includes Toronto’s Celeste Yim. The category also includes Montreal’s Barry Julien, nominated as part of the writing team on CBS/Global’s The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

Toronto-raised pop superstar Abel Tesfaye, a.k.a. the Weeknd, is part of a team up for best live variety special for his Super Bowl halftime show.

THE EARLY WINS:

Canadians who emerged victorious last weekend include Cameron for the National Geographic docuseries Secrets of the Whales on Disney Plus. The Kapuskasing, Ont.-born executive producer was part of a team that won best documentary or non-fiction series, beating out nominees including Canadian filmmakers Elliott Halpern and Elizabeth Trojian of the PBS American Masters documentary How It Feels To Be Free.

Sound designer Craig Henighan, graduate of the media arts program at Sheridan College in Oakville, Ont., shared an award with the sound editing team of Netflix’s adult animated anthology series Love, Death + Robots.

THE EARLY LOSSES:

A slew of Canadians lost out on awards at last weekend’s Creative Arts Emmys.

They included Dan Levy, whose stint guest hosting NBC’s SNL fell short to Dave Chappelle’s turn hosting the sketch comedy series.

Vancouver-born renovation twins Jonathan and Drew Scott of HGTV’s Property Brothers: Forever Home and business tycoons Kevin O’Leary and Robert Herjavec of ABC/CTV’s lost the structured reality show category to Netflix’s Queer Eye.