Emmy Nominations for Women Stand Out as Behind-the-Camera Hiring Fell

Key takeaways

• The Boxed In report found women creating original streaming series fell to 24 percent in 2025-26, down 12 percentage points from 36 percent in 2024-25, the lowest level in nearly a decade.
• Women directing streaming series fell from 32 percent to 22 percent, while female characters in major roles dropped from 49 percent to 44 percent, with age-related disparities widening across roles.
• Salli Richardson-Whitfield earned two Emmy directing nominations even as employment data showed steep declines, illustrating how individual achievement and industry hiring operate independently.

The 2026 Emmy Awards celebrated Salli Richardson-Whitfield with two nominations for directing HBO Max’s “The Gilded Age” and “Task.” Hanelle M. Culpepper was nominated for “Paradise” on Hulu. Yet around the same time, a new report found that women’s representation behind the camera had plummeted to levels unseen in nearly a decade.

The Center for the Study of Women in Television & Film at San Diego State University released its annual Boxed In report tracking women’s representation in the 2025-26 television season. The findings showed a dramatic reversal from the prior year, when women creators on streaming jumped to 36 percent. This contradiction captures a peculiar moment in television: award recognition at historic highs even as industry employment of women creators and directors contracted sharply across both streaming and broadcast platforms.

A sharp reversal in streaming employment

The Boxed In report examined over 2,500 characters and more than 3,600 behind-the-scenes credits across the 2025-26 television season. On streaming services, the share of women creating original series fell to 24 percent, down 12 percentage points from 36 percent in 2024-25. This single-year collapse wiped out all of the prior year’s gains and pushed the figure below historical levels.

Researchers at the center characterized last year’s gains as “a momentary surge as opposed to the beginning of a positive trend in employment.” The numbers of women creating shows on both platforms are now lower than they were almost a decade ago, in 2017-18. Broadcast programs saw a much smaller decline, dropping from 20 percent to 19 percent.

The sharp reversal raised questions about what sustained women creators during the 2024-25 season. While the Boxed In report did not identify specific shows or production trends driving that year’s increase, the decline suggests that whatever gains materialized proved temporary rather than durable shifts in how producers and networks staff their shows.

The employment collapse in one year
In 2025-26, women creators on streaming series dropped to 24% from 36% the prior year—a 12-percentage-point decline to levels not seen since before 2017-18. Women directors fell from 32% to 22%. Researchers characterized the prior year’s gains as “a momentary surge” rather than the start of sustained progress.

Directors and on-screen roles both fell

The employment declines extended across multiple roles. Women directing original series on streaming fell from 32 percent to 22 percent in a single year—a 10-percentage-point decline. Broadcast directing representation contracted from 18 percent to 16 percent.

Women’s on-screen representation also declined. Female characters in major roles dropped from 49 percent to 44 percent on streaming, while broadcast programs declined from 47 percent to 46 percent. Martha Lauzen, executive director of the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, noted that exceptions like the fully-realized characters played by Kathy Bates on “Matlock” or Jean Smart on “Hacks” remain atypical rather than the norm.

Age data revealed another disparity. Female characters experienced a decline as they aged from their 30s into their 40s, while male characters maintained their prevalence until they reached their 50s. This suggests television restricts visible roles for women earlier in their careers than it does for men, with the restriction tightening at older ages.

The 2026 Emmy directing race in context

The 2026 Emmy Awards presented a sharply different picture. The Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series category included Salli Richardson-Whitfield nominated twice—for “The Gilded Age” episode “My Mind Is Made Up” and “Task” episode “Out Beyond Ideas Of Wrongdoing And Rightdoing, There Is A River.” Hanelle M. Culpepper was nominated for the “Exodus” episode of “Paradise” on Hulu.

The other nominees were men: Noah Wyle for “The Pitt,” Vince Gilligan for “Pluribus,” and Saul Metzstein for “Slow Horses,” with Metzstein winning for his direction of the “Scars” episode on Apple TV. Two women among five nominees represented notable Emmy recognition, yet the broader employment data suggested such visibility did not translate to sustained directing opportunities across the industry.

The Emmy directing categories accept nominations for individual episodes of eligible series. This structure means that a director recognized for one exceptional episode may still struggle to secure directing assignments on other shows or to move into creator and leadership positions that control hiring on future projects.

Emmy voters select based on artistic achievement within a handful of acclaimed programs, while industry hiring reflects the day-to-day decisions of hundreds of producers, showrunners, and studio executives.

Why Emmy recognition and industry hiring diverge

The gap between Emmy nominations and employment data reflects how individual achievement and industry-wide hiring patterns operate independently. Emmy voters select based on artistic achievement within a handful of acclaimed programs—predominantly dramas from major studios that attract critical attention. Each nomination recognizes a single episode, not a person’s access to regular work or advancement into creator roles.

The Boxed In employment data, by contrast, captures staffing decisions across thousands of shows, including lesser-known series that rarely attract Emmy attention or prestige voters. Shows that employ larger numbers of women may be overlooked in awards consideration while still representing significant hiring decisions. The contrast illustrates how two Emmy directing nominations for women coexist with the lowest employment levels in nearly a decade—the two systems measure fundamentally different things.

Career advancement in television also follows distinct pathways. Winning a directing Emmy for a prestige drama does not guarantee increased directing assignments on other shows or automatically open doors to creator positions where women influence hiring decisions for below-the-line workers. The Emmy system rewards excellence within a small universe of prestige television while saying nothing about the hiring decisions at production companies, studios, and networks that collectively employ thousands of workers each season.

What regression to 2017-18 levels means for creators

The 2025-26 Boxed In findings represent the lowest representation of women creators in almost a decade. The steepest declines appeared among creators—the positions that grant creative control and determine who gets hired below the line. Women creators control or influence hiring decisions in their shows, shaping whether female directors, cinematographers, producers, and other crew members find work on future projects.

The fact that streaming creators, the creator category with the highest percentage of women the prior year, experienced the sharpest decline raises questions about production and greenlight decisions. Networks and producers appear to have reduced the number of shows with women in charge. This suggests that the 2024-25 gains reflected temporary factors rather than shifts in how executives and producers evaluate women as showrunners or head creative figures.

A record Emmy year can coexist with declining industry employment because the two systems serve different functions. Emmy voters select based on artistic achievement. Industry hiring reflects the day-to-day decisions of hundreds of producers, showrunners, studio executives, and network decision-makers. Until those hiring decisions change at scale, Emmy nominations remain a marker of individual excellence and achievement rather than evidence of broader industry progress in creating sustainable career pathways for women across all television roles.

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Photo: Thomas Wolf , www.foto-tw.de · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikimedia Commons