2015 Golden Globes Best TV Series – Comedy: Groundbreaking Diversity

by Olivia Truffaut-WongDecember 21, 2014, 8:41 pm >

With five diverse, and mostly female driven comedies in the running, Best TV Series – Comedy might just be the most exciting and groundbreaking category at the 2015 Golden Globes.

Best TV Series – Comedy

Nominated for the top prize are Orange is the New Black, Girls, Transparent, Jane the Virgin and Silicon Valley. The first four listed are all from female showrunners, and all except Girls are first time nominees in this category (OITNB was submitted as a drama in 2014). Furthermore, the category features the most diverse range of characters and stories than the nominees in any other category, and it also includes shows from almost every available platform – network television, cable, Netflix and Amazon originals.

Transparent, for example, is an Amazon Instant Video series created by Jill Soloway centered around a family dealing with the fallout when it’s patriarch announces he is transgender. Star, Jeffrey Tambor is also nominated for Best Actor in a TV Comedy.

Both Netflix’s Orange is the New Black and HBO’s Girls have made names for themselves for presenting authentic female characters, while freshman shows Silicon Valley (HBO earned rave reviews. But the most surprising nomination went to Jane the Virgin, the very first CW show to ever be nominated for a Golden Globe. Not only that, but Jane the Virgin is also one of the first ever bilingual shows in primetime. Inspired by a telenovela, the show features a mostly Latino cast and scenes in Spanish with subtitles (something not commonly seen on television).

“It’s literally all my favorite shows on television. Something that’s so cool about the Hollywood Foreign Press is that they recognize new and groundbreaking and forward-thinking programming,” said Girls creator and star Lena Dunham of the nominees.

Jane the Virgin showrunner, Jennie Urman, echoed Dunham’s sentiment, saying, “These are totally different shows. They all have something to say, too, in comedy, which I really love. When I was starting out, there weren’t a lot of women in these positions. To see so many women in the category is awesome to me.”