“Widow’s Bay” could be the thing that goes bump in the Emmy race.
The Television Academy knows what it likes. It’s usually the polished prestige drama, the bittersweet half-hour dramedy and the new miniseries built around a movie star and a timely message. So, when something strange wanders into the race, the instinct is to ask whether it fits. The better question, with three days of voting left, is whether the Emmys see it that way.
Apple TV’s “Widow’s Bay” is this season’s “strange something.” The horror comedy has surged over the past few weeks, with it climbing the pundits’ charts (Variety is projecting 10 nominations in its most recent update), and it could be a real force on nominations morning.
Created by Katie Dippold (“Parks and Recreation” and “Ghostbusters”), it stars Matthew Rhys as Tom Loftis, the beleaguered mayor of a cursed New England island. An artful blend of Stephen King and “The Twilight Zone,” with an absurdist sitcom tone and a “Get Out” streak humming underneath. It refuses to be one single thing. That refusal is precisely the best argument for it, and not in the exhausted way we now litigate whether “The Bear” is really a comedy.
For years the comedy and drama categories have rewarded shows that know exactly what they are. “Widow’s Bay” doesn’t, and it’s better because of the uncertainty. It can be funny and frightening in the same scene. It also can hand its biggest moments not only to a single marquee lead but to a bench of character actors, and the kind of performers that awards bodies claim to cherish but routinely overlook.
