The Bear has just broken an Emmy comedy record. But is it comedy?

“Yes, Chef” is now part of Emmy history.

The Bear has notched a record-breaking 23 Emmy nominations, setting a new high for the most nominations in a single year for a comedy series. The record previously belonged to 30 Rock, which earned 22 nominations 15 years ago.

Funny? Ebon Moss-Bachrach, from left, Ayo Edebiri and Jeremy Allen White in The Bear. Credit: AP

The Bear, – honoured overnight for its second season, which premiered in June 2023 – scored significantly more nominations compared with its first season, when it had 13. Its principal actors — Jeremy Allen White, Ayo Edebiri and Ebon Moss-Bachrach — all landed nominations. It also got nods in technical categories such as sound mixing and picture editing.

The Bear, which already won best comedy at the strike-delayed Emmys in January, will be the heavy favourite going in.

The record-setting status of The Bear, however, will surely draw a renewed round of scrutiny of how shows get slotted into different categories at the Emmys. Going back to last year, some industry insiders gnashed their teeth at the Emmy success of The Bear. Should it be honoured? Absolutely. But, seriously, in the comedy categories?

Alan Sepinwall, a TV critic for Rolling Stone, raised the point recently, asking whether “this story of toxic workplaces, addiction and mental illness, and ruinous personal relationships was a barrel of laughs.” Given that The Bear beat out 30 Rock — a beloved series that would never be mistaken for anything other than a straight-up comedy — to break the record, it could set off howls of outrage from comedy nerds.

Emmy categorisation controversy is nothing new, of course. The Peak TV era unleashed a torrent of dramatic comedies (try Atlanta), and comedic dramas (how about Succession?). Netflix’s Orange Is The New Black was nominated as a comedy one year, and as a drama the next. Long gone are the days when shows like Cheers and The West Wing had a crystal clear Emmy lane.

There is one more obstacle for The Bear. Although Emmy voters will be weighing the series’ much-celebrated second season, they’ll start casting votes in August, on the heels of the recently released third season. The third season has a considerably lower audience score on Rotten Tomatoes compared with the first two seasons. The Daily Beast even asked earlier this month, “Why is everyone saying The Bear is a bad show?”

It remains an open question whether any backlash to the current season, along with is-it-actually-a-comedy industry debates, will affect its chances to win big in September.

Other comedies have come close to the 30 Rock record in recent years. Ted Lasso recently earned 21 nominations, one shy of tying the record. And Saturday Night Live, technically a sketch variety series and not a recurring comedy series as defined by Emmy rules, earned 22 nominations in 2017.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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