32nd Primetime Emmy Awards

The 32nd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards were held Sunday, September 7, 1980 at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium. The awards show was hosted by Steve Allen and Dick Clark and broadcast on NBC.

The ceremony was held while a strike by members of the Screen Actors Guild was in progress; in a show of support for their union, 51 of the 52 nominated performers boycotted the event.^[1] Powers Boothe was the only nominated actor to attend; acknowledging his odd duck-type presence in his acceptance speech, he quipped, "this is either the most courageous moment of my career or the stupidest." (Boothe won for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Special, for his performance in Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones.)

Nominations and Winners

Outstanding Drama Series

• Lou Grant
  • Dallas
  • Family
  • The Rockford Files
  • The White Shadow

Outstanding Comedy Series

• Taxi
  • Barney Miller
  • M*A*S*H
  • Soap
  • WKRP in Cincinnati

Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series

• Edward Asner for playing "Lou Grant" on Lou Grant
  • Larry Hagman for playing J. R. Ewing on Dallas
  • Jack Klugman for playing “Dr. R. Quincy, M.E.” on Quincy, M.E.
  • James Garner for playing "Jim Rockford" on The Rockford Files

Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series

• Barbara Bel Geddes for playing Miss Ellie Ewing on Dallas
  • Kristy McNichol for playing “Letitia Lawrence” on Family
  • Sada Thompson for playing “Kate Lawrence” on Family
  • Lauren Bacall for playing “Kendall Warren” on The Rockford Files
  • Mariette Hartley for playing “Althea Morgan” on The Rockford Files

Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series

• Richard Mulligan for playing “Burt Campbell” on Soap
  • Hal Linden for playing “Capt. Barney Miller” on Barney Miller
  • Robert Guillaume for playing “Benson DuBois” on Benson
  • Alan Alda for playing “Capt. Benjamin Franklin Pierce” on M*A*S*H
  • Judd Hirsch for playing “Alex Reiger” on Taxi

Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series

• Cathryn Damon for playing “Mary Campbell” on Soap
  • Sheree North for playing “Dotty Wertz” on Archie Bunker's Place
  • Polly Holliday for playing “Florence Jean 'Flo' Castleberry” on Flo
  • Isabel Sanford for playing “Louise Jefferson” on The Jeffersons
  • Katherine Helmond for playing “Jessica Tate” on Soap

Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series

• Stuart Margolin for playing “Evelyn Martin” on The Rockford Files
  • Mason Adams for playing “Charlie Hume” on Lou Grant
  • Robert Walden for playing “Joe Rossi” on Lou Grant
  • Noah Beery Jr for playing “Joseph Rockford” on The Rockford Files

Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series

• Nancy Marchand for playing “Margaret Pynchon” on Lou Grant
  • Nina Foch for playing “Mrs. Polk” on Lou Grant
  • Linda Kelsey for playing “Billie Newman” on Lou Grant
  • Jessica Walter for playing “Melanie Townsend McIntyre” on Trapper John, M.D.

Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series

• Harry Morgan for playing Sherman T. Potter on M*A*S*H
  • Max Gail for playing “Det. Stan Wojciehowicz” on Barney Miller
  • Steve Landesberg for playing “Sgt. Arthur Dietrich” on Barney Miller
  • Mike Farrell for playing B. J. Hunnicutt on M*A*S*H
  • Howard Hesseman for playing “Johnny Caravella ” on WKRP in Cincinnati

Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series

• Loretta Swit for playing “Margaret Houlihan” on M*A*S*H
  • Loni Anderson for playing “Jennifer Marlowe” on WKRP in Cincinnati
  • Polly Holliday for playing “Florence Jean 'Flo' Castleberry” on Alice
  • Inga Swenson for playing "Gretchen Kraus" on Benson

Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series

• Lou Grant
  • Tenspeed and Brown Shoe
  • Skag

Outstanding Directing in a Drama Series

• Lou Grant
  • Skag

Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series

• Barney Miller
  • The Associates
  • M*A*S*H
  • Taxi

Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series

• Taxi
  • M*A*S*H

References