The West Wing had an outstanding night on the evening of August 27 as the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences presented the Emmy 2000 Creative Arts Awards. The program walked away with four of the nine technical Emmy Awards for which it was nominated.
It will come as no surprise that the program received a nod for Outstanding Casting for a Drama Series; after only one year, the cast is widely recognized as one of the finest ensembles currently working in television. Composer W.G. Snuffy Walden also received an Emmy for the Main Title Theme Music. The much-commented-upon theme, frequently described as "patriotic" and "stirring" sets the tone for a program sometimes given the heavy credit -- or burden -- of bringing a sense of pride back to depictions of the public service.
The program also received Emmys for Outstanding Art Direction for a Single-Camera Series and Outstanding Cinematography for a Single-Camera Series (in both cases, the Pilot episode was submitted for consideration). The Art Director (and his or her team) is responsible for the overall look of a project -- the sets, the props, and so on. Partly for that reason, it's appropriate that the program also won for Cinematography. The Cinematographer is responsible for how a series or film is shot -- camera angles, tracking, and related matters. Together, the Art Direction and Cinematography teams under their respective leaders take the credit for the "look" of a series or film project. In the case of The West Wing, they are responsible for for making the program visually rich as well as creating a great deal of the atmosphere that makes the episodes so intense.
You can't win 'em all, of course, and The West Wing's technical crew did not win all the
categories in which they were nominated. Episodes What Kind of Day has it Been? and
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