Jon Hamm’s not exactly hurting for Emmy nominations at this point: Although he’s only won the big, pointy statue once—for the Mad Men finale, back in 2015—Hamm’s been nominated 18 times in various acting categories over the last 20 years, often for multiple roles in the same awards season. (Mostly thanks to the contrast between Don Draper and his far sillier guest star turns on 30 Rock.) Still, as far as reasons not to get nominated for an Emmy go, a disqualification over rule confusion’s gotta be pretty lousy—which is exactly what happened to Hamm this week.
It’s like this (per Variety): Hamm’s pals at Apple TV were apparently all fired up to submit him for his work on the most recent season of The Morning Show, which he’d previously been nominated for (as a supporting actor) back in 2024. Thing is, Hamm was only in three episodes of the most recent season of the drama, which created a somewhat complicated push-and-pull between the TV Academy’s rules about how large supporting and guest roles can be, and the new one it implemented last year that says that, if you’ve already been nominated for Outstanding Lead or Supporting Actor or Actress for a specific role, you can’t then submit as a guest star for it down the line. (The Emmys don’t give specific justifications for these kinds of changes, but a lot of people suspected this particular patch was added because people were annoyed that Claire Foy won a Guest Star Emmy in 2021 for popping back up on The Crown in flashbacks, after her main tenure on the series was over.) The upshot of the confusion is that Hamm wasn’t eligible for the award he’d been submitted for—thus his disqualification this week.
Don’t feel too bad for Jon Hamm, though: He’s still submitting elsewhere, in both the animated categories (for his Fox cartoon comedy Grimsburg) as well as his other Apple show, Your Friends And Neighbors. Really, the Emmys love nominating Hamm for things; they’re probably more heartbroken than anybody at having this opportunity to do it be so cruelly stolen from them.
