They Decided It Was Time to Take Lead

For the last two years, Allison Janney, who plays White House spokeswoman C.J. Craig on NBC’s “The West Wing,” nominated herself for an Emmy as best supporting actress in a drama series--and won. This year, she upped the ante, asking the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences to select her for best lead actress in a drama series.

Ditto for Jennifer Aniston on the network’s long-running comedy “Friends.”

So, what gives? Did Janney and Aniston get bigger roles or bigger egos?

“It certainly can be fluid,” said John Leverence, the academy’s vice president of awards. “It really depends on the performer’s perception of how they functioned, either as lead or support, in the series during the current eligibility year.”

The academy reviews all of the entries and--although Leverence won’t name names--it has bumped actors who nominated themselves in the lead category back down to the supporting category.

“We have a number of entries that we felt were inappropriate, and we changed them,” he said.

Dana Calvo