BEST ACTOR, DRAMA
KEN TUCKER: Gillian, I really want a cast member of The Wire to win in this category — a boy can dream, can't he? If only Clarke Peters, as the great old police pro Lester Freamon, could be nominated among inevitables like Mad Men's Jon Hamm, I'd be happy.
GILLIAN FLYNN: In my long-shot category, I must add Friday Night Lights' Kyle Chandler: As a Texas high school football coach, he's earnest, moral, stubborn, grown-up, and totally real. It's the opposite of scenery chewing — he has no big ''Emmy moments'' — but wow, does he deserve a nod.
KEN: Yep, I'd hand a trophy to Chandler. May I also make a pitch for Bryan Cranston in Breaking Bad? I thought the series was very uneven in its first season — it's hard to do a light drama about a high school teacher with cancer and a side business cooking meth — but Cranston really made you feel for the poor shlub he plays.
GILLIAN: Cranston! Yes! And speaking of great performances in uneven shows, I thought this past season of Rescue Me went off the rails, but I never get bored watching Denis Leary. Unlike Kyle Chandler, Leary has never met a scene he can keep his teeth off, but whatever mad mood his New York firefighter is in, I can't turn away.
OUR PICKS (clockwise from top left): Clarke Peters, Bryan Cranston, Denis Leary, Kyle Chandler
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