The New Normal, Smash and True Blood Nominated For GLAAD Awards

Ryan Murphy’s new NBC comedy The New Normal and HBO’s supernatural favourite True Blood are amongst the shows to receive nominations in the 24th Annual GLAAD Media Awards.

The awards are to recognise “fair and inclusive” representations of the LGBT community on television. NBC led this year’s nominations with nods in 6 categories followed by 4 ABC. However, once again cable networks are ahead of their broadcast network counterparts with a total of 21 nominations compared to 17 across all five networks. Cable broadcasters such as HBO and Showtime are often signalled out for having a more diverse representation of the LGBT community across its shows.

“Images and stories from the LGBT community continue to push support for equality to historic levels. This year’s nominees enlighten and entertain, but also reflect a new American landscape where a growing majority accept and value their LGBT family, colleagues and friends. Now more than ever, viewers not only accept gay and transgender characters and plot lines, they expect them — just as they both accept and expect LGBT people to be a valuable part of their everyday lives.” – Herndon Graddick, GLAAD President in a statement.

In the outstanding Drama Series category ABC’s Grey’s Anatomy faces competition for HBO’s long-running supernatural favourite True Blood and NBC’s comedy musical Smash as well as The L.A Complex – the Canadian drama which aired on The CW and was recently cancelled – and fellow Canadian series Degrassi which airs on Teen Nick.

Of the four remaining daytime soaps left on-air in America only CBS’s The Bold and the Beautiful and NBC’s Days of our Lives have been nominated in ‘Outstanding Daily Drama’ category. ABC’s General Hospital and CBS’s other daytime soap, The Young and the Restless, have not received nominations. The Bold and the Beautiful and Days of our Lives have both introduced gay storylines in the past 12 months.

Ryan Murphy has the honour of having three of his shows nomination with two of them up against each other in the same category. Murphy’s new NBC comedy The New Normal, starring Justin Bartha and Andrew Rannells, is up against his Fox series Glee in the Comedy category. Meanwhile Murphy’s FX series American Horror Story has been nominated in the TV Movie or Mini-Series category.

The list of nominations are as follows:

Outstanding Drama Series:
Degrassi – TeenNick
Grey’s Anatomy – ABC
The L.A. Complex – The CW
Smash – NBC
True Blood – HBO

Outstanding Daily Drama
The Bold and the Beautiful – CBS
Days of Our Lives – NBC

Outstanding Mini-Series/TV Movie
American Horror Story: Asylum -FX
Hit and Miss – DirecTV
Political Animals – USA

Outstanding Comedy Series
Glee – Fox
Go On – NBC
Happy Endings – ABC
Modern Family – ABC
The New Normal – NBC

Outstanding Individual Episode
(A series without a regular LGBT character)
Raising Hope:  Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Me What to Do – Fox
Drop Dead Diva: Family Matters – Lifetime
Franklin & Bash: L’Affaire Du Coeur – TNT
Touch: Lost and Found – Fox
The Mentalist: Ruby Slippers,” CBS

Outstanding Reality Show
The Amazing Race – CBS
It Is What It Is,  Here Comes Honey Boo Boo – TLC
The Real L Word – Showtime
Small Town Security – AMC
Welcome to Hollywood, Pregnant in Heels – Bravo

Outstanding Talk Show (Single Episode)
Oprah’s Next Chapter: At Home with Neil Patrick Harris, His Fiancé David Burtka, & Their Twins – OWN
The Ellen DeGeneres Show:  Autoshop Restores Bullied Gay Student’s Car for Free (syndicated)
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart: Bishop Gene Robinson – Comedy Central
The Jeff Probst Show:  The Husband Who is Now a Woman and the Daughter Who is Now a Son (syndicated)
The Suze Orman Show: Marriage Equality – CNBC