BAFTA TV Awards: ‘Bad Sisters’ and ‘Derry Girls’ win big

It was a big night for Irish talent at this year’s British version of the Emmys, the BAFTA TV Awards, which were doled out at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Hosted by Romesh Ranganathan and Rob Beckett, two Irish series — – “Bad Sisters” and “Derry Girls”  — won a pair of prizes as did the telefilm “I Am Ruth.”

“Derry Girls” won Best Scripted Comedy for its fourth and final season, which was a lovely parting gift for writer and creator Lisa McGee. The show beat out “Ghosts,” “Big Boys,” and “Am I Being Unreasonable?” although the latter did pick up the prize for Best Comedy Actor for 14-year-old Lenny Rush. He edged out Matt Berry (“What We Do In The Shadows”), Joseph Gilgun (“Brassic”), Stephen Merchant (“The Outlaws”), Jon Pointing (“Big Boys”), and Daniel Radcliffe (“Weird: The Al Yankovic Story”).

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“Derry Girls” also won Best Comedy Actress for Siobhán McSweeney, who bested Taj Atwal (“Hullraisers”), Lucy Beaumont (“Meet The Richardsons”) Daisy May Cooper (“Am I Being Unreasonable?”), Natasia Demetriou (“Ellie & Natasia”), and Diane Morgan (“Cunk On Earth”). McGee also won Best Comedy Writer at the BAFTA Craft Awards, bringing the show’s tally to three.

Meanwhile, Emmy-hopeful “Bad Sisters” had a very good evening after also winning at the Craft Awards, when it took home Best Titles and Graphic Identity. Tonight, it took home Best Drama Series, with Sharon Horgan now on a total of two BAFTA wins (she won Best Scripted Comedy for “Motherland” last year). “Bad Sisters” won over “The Responder,” “Sherwood,” and “Somewhere Boy.” The Apple TV+ hit also won Best Supporting Actress for Anne-Marie Duff, who triumphed over Adelayo Adedayo (“The Responder”), Saffron Hocking (“Top Boy”), Jasmine Jobson (“Top Boy”), Lesley Manville (“Sherwood”), and Fiona Shaw (“Andor”). That’s also three BAFTA wins in total for “Bad Sisters” while the Emmy nomination chances for both the show and Duff have now surely increased after these wins.

Another Emmy hopeful, Ben Whishaw, also had a good night. He won Best Actor for “This is Going to Hurt” against a star-studded line-up including Gary Oldman (“Slow Horses”), Taron Egerton (“Black Bird”), Chaske Spencer (“The English”), Martin Freeman (“The Responder”), and Cillian Murphy (“Peaky Blinders”). Whishaw will be hoping for an Emmy bid for Best TV Movie/Mini-Series Actor. However, his show surprisingly lost Best Mini-Series to “Mood,” which also beat “The Thief, His Wife And The Canoe” and “A Spy Among Friends.”

Oscar-winner Kate Winslet had an emotional evening as she won two BAFTAs — one for Best Actress for “I Am Ruth” (over Sarah Lancashire for “Julia,” Vicky McClure for “Without Sin,” Maxine Peake ” for “Anne,” Billie Piper for “I Hate Suzie Too,” and Imelda Staunton for “The Crown”) and the other for Best Single Drama for the same show. “I Am Ruth” topped “The House” and “Life and Death in the Warehouse” to take that prize.

Elsewhere, Adeel Akhtar won Best Supporting Actor for “Sherwood” (besting Samuel Bottomley for “Somewhere Boy,” Salim Daw for “The Crown,” Josh Finan for “The Responder,” Jack Lowden for “Slow Horses,” and Will Sharpe for “The White Lotus”); reality TV show sensation “The Traitors” won Best Reality and Constructed Factual as well as Best Entertainment Performance for Claudia Winkleman; Olympian Mo Farah won Best Documentary for “The Real Mo Farah;” and Best International Feature went to “Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story,” which topped several other Emmy-hopefuls including “The Bear,” “Wednesday,” “The White Lotus,” “Oussekine,” and “Pachinko.”

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