‘Only Murders in the Building': After surprise success at SAG, how big can Season 4 get at the Emmys?
Last year, Only Murders in the Building scored its most Emmy nominations yet with 21 — 10 more than the total it nabbed the year prior for its second season and four more than it earned for Season 1. But can it go even bigger this year with Season 4?
The murder mystery is coming off its best winter awards run following double surprise victories at the Screen Actors Guild Awards for Martin Short's performance and comedy ensemble. They are the show's first major industry prizes — perhaps a preview of its first major Emmy win? Only Murders in the Building has won seven Emmys from 49 nominations for its first three seasons, but all have been at the Creative Arts Emmys.
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The Hulu series has 35 submissions across 16 categories for Season 4. Let's take a look at its Emmy prospects.
Only Murders in the Building is safely in here. Don't even question it. It would've been safe even without its SAG triumphs, but it's even more so now. The SAG wins have no doubt boosted it all the way to third place in the odds, behind Hacks and The Studio, which means it has bumped down 2023 champ The Bear to fourth, the lowest the show's ever been in the odds through three seasons. On the flip side, Only Murders had never been higher than fourth place through its first three seasons.
As the reigning SAG champ, Short is unsurprisingly in first in the odds. He's also the only one of the trio who's been Emmy-nominated every season so far. This is where things get tricky. Unless there's a tie, Best Comedy Actor is slated to have five slots this year, just like in 2023 ... when Steve Martin missed. Martin, who was nominated in 2022 and 2024 with six slots (there was only supposed to be five slots last year too, but there was a tie in one of the comedy lead categories), is currently in sixth place in the odds. Not helping matters is that he was snubbed by SAG for the second year in a row while Short not only made back in after last year's snub but won. But if Martin is sidelined again by the Emmys, no one ought to be surprised.
SEE Jane Lynch on her 'funny and touching' final scene with Steve Martin on Only Murders in the Building
Selena Gomez finally netted her first acting nomination last year, but similar to Martin, she's in a precarious position this year with the lineup cut down to five. Did she only make it in last year because of the extra sixth slot and a soft field? If you consider Jean Smart (Hacks), Ayo Edebiri (The Bear), and Quinta Brunson (Abbott Elementary) locked, there are two spots up for grabs. Kristen Bell (Nobody Wants This) is in fourth in the odds, but she has never been nominated before. Natasha Lyonne is in fifth and was nominated for the first season of Poker Face, but its sophomore installment (or specifically, its first eligible half) has been rather quiet. Gomez is in sixth, one spot ahead of Kathryn Hahn who could be a double nominee with Agatha All Along in lead and The Studio in supporting. Or maybe now that Gomez has broken through, she's "in" with voters. Her shock over the cast's SAG win and endearing speech also don't hurt.
Last year, Only Murders cracked the supporting categories for the first time with bids for Paul Rudd and Meryl Streep. Both are in the running again this year, the former for playing a different character, Glen Stubbins. Rudd is one of the show's six submissions in supporting actor, its most ever. The others are Michael Cyril Creighton, Zach Galifianakis, Richard Kind, Eugene Levy, and Kumail Nanjiani. Rudd is ranked the highest in 13th place, followed by Galifianakis, who played a fictionalized version of himself cast to play Oliver (Short) in the film-within-the-show, in 18th place. While all the actors were uniformly great, there wasn't a true standout and they run the risk of vote-splitting. The category gained a seventh slot this year, but Shrinking is back with multiple contenders and The Studio has Sal Saperstein himself (Ike Barinholtz).
Only Murders has four submissions here, for Streep, Eva Longoria, Jane Lynch, and Molly Shannon. Streep only appeared in three of the season's 10 episodes, but she is forced to compete in supporting because of her nomination here last year, due to a new rule that prevents past lead or supporting nominees from going guest for the same role on the same show. She's in eighth place in the odds, one spot out of the predicted lineup, and it feels like she's that high because she's Meryl Streep. Her big episode, "Valley of the Dolls," is a killer one for her, and if voters are checking off Melissa McCarthy for that episode (more on that later), they'd likely check off Streep as well. But just like with the male category, this show also has to contend with hopefuls from Shrinking and The Studio.
Lynch, who's in 23rd place, was nominated in guest in 2022 and would probably have a better shot there, but she was in too many episodes. She does, however, have one of the most moving moments of the season when her dearly departed stuntwoman Sazz Pataki and Charles (Martin) say their final goodbye.
"We knew it was special and the scene was written very beautifully," Lynch told Gold Derby. "It was so quiet. … I thought that they shot it beautifully. He's sitting there alone, and then all of a sudden he changed the camera angle and I'm sitting there with him and we're in the same posture as we always were. We copied. I copied the way Steve moved. There was a bittersweet aspect to the scene, like she knew it was over and that she was going to be moving on now, wherever that was. And he knew that she probably wouldn't be coming back to visit.'
Disney/Patrick Harbron
Though Only Murders got 21 nominations last year, it was not nominated in directing or writing, and it's going to need both in order to be win-competitive. But it's in danger of missing directing again. In fact, it hasn't been nominated in directing since Season 1, when it got double bids. There will be six slots again, just like the past two years, but it's really just five since one slot is reserved for a multicam series. Only Murders submitted three episodes — "Blow-Up," "My Best Friend's Wedding," and "Once Upon a Time in the West" — which is not ideal when you're looking to return to the lineup for the first time in three years in a tight category. Last year, the show entered two episodes in directing. If one does make the cut this year, it could be "Blow-Up," the sixth episode directed by Jessica Yu that's filmed in found footage style.
Team Arconia was much more prudent when it came to writing, which will have six slots again, entering just one episode, the season premiere, "Once Upon a Time in the West." Penned by John Hoffman and Joshua Allen Griffith, the episode also received a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for episodic comedy. Only Murders was snubbed in writing for the first time last year, but a single submission is the best possible position it could put itself in to return.
Only Murders has scored a nomination in this category every year so far (and a win for Nathan Lane in 2022), and it'll be up to Ron Howard to keep the streak going. The Oscar winner plays a fictionalized version of himself and is the show's only submission here. The problem is Howard also plays a fictionalized version of himself on The Studio, for which he's expected to get a nomination, sitting in fourth place in the odds. In contrast, he's in 42nd place for Only Murders. Performers are allowed to get multiple nominations in the same category, but they're usually for, you know, playing completely different characters.
SEE Selena Gomez, Martin Short, Steve Martin, and the Only Murders in the Building cast share their personal highlights from Season 4
The series is fielding two hopefuls here: a nominee last year who's been with the show since the beginning and a two-time champ who's won this category before. Da'Vine Joy Randolph pocketed her first nomination for Only Murders last year, fresh off her Oscar win for The Holdovers, and is guest-eligible again, having reprised her role as Det. Williams in four episodes. She's in 13th place in the odds and probably would be higher if it weren't for the aforementioned McCarthy, who was absolutely riotous as Charles' doll-collecting sister Doreen who gets into a wrestling match with Loretta (Streep) over Oliver. The category will have six slots again, and McCarthy, who won this award for Saturday Night Live in 2017, is in sixth place.
Only Murders has never lost production design, so lock it in for at least a nomination once again. The series ought to land in its usual below-the-line categories like casting (especially for such a star-studded season), score, cinematography, costumes, non-prosthetic makeup, hairstyling, score, and sound mixing. While it does not have a music and lyrics submission this year — a category it won last year, thus completing Benj Pasek and Justin Paul's EGOT — it has submitted in stunt coordination and twice in stunt performance for "Escape From Planet Klongo" and "Valley of the Dolls."
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