Actor Peter MacNicol was last week announced as an Emmy nominee for his supporting work as Jeff Kane in HBO’s political comedy, Veep. However, this week the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the organization that votes on the Emmys, deemed him ineligible for the outstanding guest role category because he has appeared in more than 50% of the show’s current season.
MacNicol has appeared in five of the 10 episodes of Veep’s fifth season – which was not the case when the Emmy nominations were announced on 14 July. The recent rule, instituted in 2015, was part of an overhaul made in 2014.
On Thursday, the Academy replaced MacNicol’s nomination with a place on the shortlist for Peter Scolari, who plays the newly out-of-the-closet gay father of Lena Dunham’s character on Girls.
USA Today reports that HBO had told the Academy that MacNicol was to appear on only four episodes of Veep this season, making him eligible for the award. For making a very short appearance in the documentary episode Kissing Your Sister, the actor was automatically disqualified. According to a statement released by HBO, the episodes for the second half of the fifth season had not been completed when MacNicol’s name was submitted for Emmy consideration.
MacNicol won an Emmy in 2001 for his performance in Fox’s law show Ally McBeal. He is also a three-time nominee for his work on CBS’s Newhart.
Scolari now joins fellow nominees in his category: Bob Newhart (The Big Bang Theory), Tracy Morgan (Saturday Night Live), Bradley Whitford (Transparent) and Martin Mull (Veep).
This doesn’t mark the first time an actor has been cut from the same category: in 2000, Henry Winkler was forced out for his performance in NBC’s Battery Park, because his guest appearance aired after the 31 May deadline.
