Cary Joji Fukunaga has received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Director for a Drama Series for HBO’s “True Detective.”
The 66th Primetime Emmy Award nominations were announced Thursday by actress Mindy Kaling (“The Mindy Project”) and TV personality Carson Daly at the Leonard H. Goldenson Theatre in North Hollywood.
Fukunaga will be competing with Tim Van Patten (“Boardwalk Empire”), Vince Gilligan (“Breaking Bad”), David Evans (“Downton Abbey”), Neil Marshall (“Game of Thrones”), and Carl Franklin (“House of Cards”).
“True Detective” stars Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey as Louisana State Police Detectives Rust Cohle and Martin Hart, who are brought in to revisit a homicide case they worked in 1995. Both have been nominated for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series.
The show has received 12 nominations, including Outstanding Drama Series, Main Title Design, Makeup for a Single-Camera Series (Non-prosthetic), Music Composition for a Series (Original Dramatic Score), Art Direction for a Contemporary or Fantasy Series (Single-Camera), Writing for a Drama Series, Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Drama Series, Casting for a Drama Series, and Cinematography for a Single-Camera Series.
Fukunaga, who is also one of the show’s executive producers, is known for the feature films “Sin Nombre” (2009) and “Jane Eyre” (2011) and the short films “Kofi” (2003), “Victoria para chino” (2004), and “Sleepwalking in the Rift” (2012). He has also been a cinematographer and camera operator for other directors’ films.
The Emmy announcement coincided with Fukunaga’s 37th birthday. Born in Oakland to a Japanese father and a Swedish mother, he graduated from UC Santa Cruz and studied film at New York University.
The awards ceremony will be held on Aug. 25 at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles.
Nominees in other categories include:
• Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Series — Junko Tsunashima, supervising producer, for PBS’ “American Masters.” Also nominated: “Cosmos,” “Pioneers of Television,” “The World Wars,” “Years of Living Dangerously.”
• Outstanding Art Direction for a Contemporary Program (Half-hour or Less) — Ray Yamagata, production designer, and Chikako Suzuki, art director, for Showtime’s “House of Lies.” Also nominated: “The Big Bang Theory,” “Modern Family,” “Silicon Valley,” “Veep.”
• Outstanding Art Direction for Variety, Nonfiction, Reality or Reality-Competition Program: Akira Yoshimura for NBC’s “Saturday Night Live.” Yoshimura and his team have been nominated every year since 2009 and finally won in 2013. His affiliation with SNL goes back to its first season in 1975. Also nominated: “Cosmos,” “The Oscars,” “Portlandia,” “Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony” and “The Voice.”
• Outstanding Casting for a Drama Series — Kiira Arai, CSA, casting director, for AMC’s “Breaking Bad.” Also nominated: “Game of Thrones,” “The Good Wife,” “House of Cards,” “True Detective.”
• Outstanding Hairstyling for a Single-Camera Series — Ai Nakata, hair stylist, for AMC’s “Mad Men.” Also nominated: “Boardwalk Empire,” “Downton Abbey,” “Game of Thrones.”
• Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Variety Series or Special — Tim Hatayama, music mix recordist, for NBC’s “The Voice.” Also nominated: “The Beatles: The Night That Changed America,” “The 56th Grammy Awards,” “The Kennedy Center Honors,” “The Oscars.”
• Outstanding Special Visual Effects — Tracy Takahashi, visual effects producer, and Jonathan Tanimoto, digital effects supervisor, for ABC’s “Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” Also nominated: “Almost Human,” “Cosmos,” “Game of Thrones,” “The 100.”
• Outstanding Special and Visual Effects in a Supporting Role — The VFX team of CBS’ “Hawaii Five-0” for the episode “Ho’onani Makuakane,” which dealt with the internment of Japanese Americans in Hawaii during World War II. Also nominated: “Black Sails,” “Da Vinci’s Demons,” “Mob City,” “Vikings, “The Walking Dead.”
• Outstanding Stunt Coordination for a Drama Series, Miniseries or Movie — Hiro Koda, stunt coordinator, for HBO’s “True Blood.” Also nominated: “The Blacklist,” “Game of Thrones,” “Grimm,” “Hawaii Five-0,” “Revolution.”