Wondering how people are already winning Emmys when the ceremony hasn’t happened yet?

The 76th Primetime Emmy Awards will air live on ABC on September 15, 2024, yet online reports show some stars and production personnel collecting their trophies a week early. If you’re wondering why, it’s because of a lesser-known event called the Creative Arts Emmy Awards.

The Creative Arts Emmy Awards are a two-night affair to distribute accolades to the often lower-profile types who keep the entertainment business running. It takes hundreds, if not thousands of workers to make a movie or television series, yet the major awards shows usually focus solely on big awards like best actor, best director, and outstanding series. This ceremony honors the set decorators, video editors, production designers, casting directors, and other workers that make television possible.

The Creative Arts Emmys

The Creative Arts Emmy Awards celebrates the best technical and artistic achievements in American television. The first such awards ceremony was held in 1970 alongside the 22nd Primetime Emmy Awards. Over fifty years later, there are so many categories that the Creative Arts Emmy Awards are split into two categories and the events are held on two separate nights.

In 2024, The Television Academy held the Daytime Creative Arts Awards in Los Angeles at the Peacock Theater on Saturday, September 7. Emmy Awards for nonfiction and non-scripted shows like NBC’s Saturday Night Live, Jim Henson: Idea Man, and The Oscars were handed out.

On Sunday, September 8, the Primetime Creative Arts Awards ceremony was held at the same location. The big winners that evening were the FX series Shōgun, FX on Hulu’s The Bear, and Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building. Included in the Creative Arts category commercials and guest actor appearances, which is how Jamie Lee Curtis and Jon Bernthal each won their first Emmy Awards for guest roles on The Bear.

Who attends The Creative Arts Emmys?

While the red carpet might not be quite as impressive as its Primetime counterpart, the Creative Arts Emmy Awards do attract their fair share of V.I.P. attendees. In addition to all of the celebrities and important directors, producers, and casting agents, stars who have previously won in these categories often attend to hand out this year’s awards.

This year, presenters for the Primetime Creative Arts Awards included Curtis, Brie Larson, Parker Posey, Phillipa Soo, Judy Reyes, Giovanni Ribisi, Alex Edelman, Austin Stowell, Allison Tolman, Damon Wayans Jr., and Jimmy O. Yang.

When and where can we watch the Creative Arts Emmy Awards?

Both evenings of the Creative Arts Emmy Awards will be edited into a single broadcast which will air on Saturday, September 14 at 8PM PST on FXX. This program will also be available to stream on Hulu the next day, Sunday, September 15, 2024.

Meanwhile, the main event, the 76th Primetime Emmy Awards, will honor the best in prime time programming from June 1, 2023 through May 31, 2024 as chosen by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. That awards ceremony will be held at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles and will air live on September 15 at 8PM PST on ABC. Father and son duo (and stars of Schitt’s Creek) Eugene and Dan Levy will host the event.