Netflix topples HBO in Emmy nominations

Netflix, home of “The Crown” and “Stranger Things,” set a new high for digital streaming, overtaking HBO in Emmy award nominations for the first time.

Netflix secured 112 nominations — more than any other network — while HBO received 108, according to the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. The candidates for the 70th Emmy Awards were announced in Los Angeles on Thursday, drawn from a record-breaking 9,100 entries.

Netflix’s accolades follow a rapid ascent in the television world. After its start two decades ago as a DVD-by-mail operation, the company has become a Hollywood powerhouse, signing popular producers, comedians and actors for original content. The company spends about $8 billion a year on new shows and films, far exceeding HBO and other competitors.

Netflix’s most nominated show was “The Crown” with 13, including for best drama series. The awards will be handed out at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles on Sept. 17 and broadcast on NBC.

Beloved graphic novel adaptation gets cast

Some graphic novels are so beloved, fans are especially protective of how they are adapted — from who gets to embody certain characters to who gets to take the reins.

On Wednesday, as Variety reported, an especially cherished comic epic, DC/Vertigo’s “Y: The Last Man” by Brian K. Vaughan and artist Pia Guerra, is being fully realized with an encouragingly talented cast.

If the FX project does not soar, it certainly won’t be for lack of pedigree.

“Y: The Last Man,” which for years couldn’t get on track as a feature-film project, is being guided to screen by comics-savvy co-showrunners Michael Green and Aida Mashaka Croal, who between them have a stellar track record with such shows as “American Gods,” “Smallville,” “Luke Cage” and “Jessica Jones.”

The main cast for the pilot of the drama series, titled “Y,” will be headed by Oscar-nominated Diane Lane as Jennifer Brown, a politically tough junior senator who is mother to the last human man standing, young Yorick Brown, and his sister, Hero Brown.

Barry Keoghan (“Dunkirk,” “The Killing of a Sacred Deer”) will star as Yorick, the main character in this post-apocalyptic “gendercide,” and Imogen Poots (“I Kill Giants”) will play Hero. Elsewhere, Marin Ireland will reportedly play presidential assistant Nora, and Juliana Canfield (“Succession”) will portray Yorick’s love interest, Beth.