A brand new category at this year’s National Television Awards (NTAs) will recognise the huge popularity of star-centred shows and see reality documentaries starring Tyson Fury, Gordon Ramsay, Vinnie Jones and Danny Dyer go head-to-head for the inaugural award.
The new Reality Docuseries category recognises the rise of fly-on-the-wall celebrity-led shows, joining the already-established Reality Competition category, which sees nods for both The Traitors and The Celebrity Traitors, I’m A Celebrity… South Africa, and Big Brother, Love Island and The Apprentice.
Announcing this year’s long-list of nominations ahead of September’s awards ceremony, the NTAs said Alan Carr will be up against Ant and Dec, Alison Hammond, Claudia Winkleman and Sir David Attenborough for best TV presenter.
Sir David, who has just celebrated his 100th birthday, also has nods for five different programmes in the Factual Entertainment category, for A Gorilla Story: Told By David Attenborough, Wild London, Secret Garden, Kingdom, and Parenthood.
The five shows are competing against Louis Theroux’s Inside The Manosphere, and The Reluctant Traveller with Eugene Levy, which featured exclusive interviews with the Prince of Wales on one of its episodes last year.
The Drama Performance category sees heavyweights including Dame Emma Thompson receiving a nod for thriller Down Cemetery Road, Martin Clunes for Power: The Downfall Of Huw Edwards, Tom Hiddleston for The Night Manager, and Brenda Blethyn for A Woman Of Substance.
Another category, Authored Documentary, sees nominations for shows that include posthumous appearances from Caroline Flack and Ozzy Osbourne, in Caroline Flack: Search For The Truth and Sharon & Ozzy Osbourne: Coming Home respectively.
Also nominated in the category are Heston: My Life With Bipolar, Molly-Mae: Behind It All, Our Girls: The Southport Families, and Sir Chris Hoy: Cancer, Courage And Me.
Comedy sees nods for Amandaland, Here We Go, Small Prophets and Alan Carr’s Changing Ends, along with Last One Laughing and Saturday Night Live UK.
As well as being nominated in the TV presenter category, Carr is also recognised in the Quiz Show section for Alan Carr’s Picture Slam, which is up against Ant & Dec’s Limitless Win, Michael McIntyre’s The Wheel, Pointless, and The 1% Club among others.
And Carr is also nominated in the Talent Show list for Interior Design Masters With Alan Carr, facing stiff competition from Strictly Come Dancing, The Great British Bake Off, RuPaul’s Drag Race UK, MasterChef and Britain’s Got Talent.
Serial drama sees nominations for the UK’s favourite soaps – Coronation Street, EastEnders, Emmerdale, Hollyoaks, and Home and Away – while actors including Eastenders’ Paul Bradley, Emmerdale’s Jeff Hordley and Coronation Street’s Gareth Pierce are up against each other for Serial Drama Performance.
Nominated in the new Reality Docuseries category are shows including At Home With The Furys, Being Gordon Ramsay, Clarkson’s Farm, Raising Chelsea, Stacey & Joe, The Dyers’ Caravan Park, and Vinnie Jones In The Country.
There are also nominations for categories including New Drama, Returning Drama, Daytime, and The Bruce Forsyth Entertainment Award – with the latter seeing The Assembly, The Claudia Winkleman Show, The Masked Singer, The Graham Norton Show, and Gladiators all in the running.
The ceremony will be hosted for the sixth time by Joel Dommett and will be held on September 8 at The O2 London, and broadcast live on ITV1 and ITVX.
This year marks the 31st NTAs, with the public able to vote for who they want to win in each category by visiting www.nationaltvawards.com
The deadline for votes is May 29, with the shortlist revealed in August when the final round of voting begins.
