Brittany Allen in 'The Pitt.' Warrick Page/HBO Max As the second season of The Pitt began airing, Brittany Allen began seeing a passionate fan reaction to her character, Roxie Hamler, a terminally ill cancer patient, and saw her name pop up on a number of early Emmys predictions lists.
But despite that early buzz, HBO did not submit Allen for Emmys contention, leading the actress to self-submit herself in the category of outstanding guest actress in a drama series.
“As a working class actor, I have become very familiar with being overlooked in my career, and you toughen your skin, and you just keep your head down, and you keep working, and you keep bettering yourself. And then you reach a point where you go, you know what? I don’t want to get overlooked anymore,” Allen said of the decision.
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The move, as well as the social media “For Your Consideration” campaign Allen and her husband embarked on, paid off as she received an Emmy nomination Wednesday for playing Hamler, who has a six-episode arc as she enters the hospital with a broken leg, and then makes the heartbreaking decision to remain there to die, rather than return home to her family. Jeff Kober, another guest star on the series, also self-submitted and was nominated — though Allen said the two never met due to their separate storylines and the immersive nature of the set.
The Emmy nomination comes after a long career in the industry, with Allen starting as a young actor in Canada, and then appearing on All My Children, for which she received a Daytime Emmy Award, and continuing to work in film and television in the U.S.
“I felt a calm sense of accomplishment when I saw my name on the list,” Allen said. “It’s funny sometimes when big news comes your way, it doesn’t hit you with a loud scream and champagne popping, it’s actually something more deep and meaningful than that.”
She spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about the realities of the industry for working actors, and what an Emmy nomination can mean for a career (she’s already seeing potential success in nabbing an agent, but weighing the costs of continuing to campaign).
What went into your decision to self-submit?
When my episodes were airing, and I started to see the impact that it was having on the audience, and hearing firsthand from so many people who were moved by the story, I realized just how many people had been affected by it, and that, of course, is an ode to the show as a whole, to the writers, to the directing, the editing, the entire ensemble, and then also to the work that I put into that character, and then shortly after, there were some early predictions lists coming out, I think the Feinberg forecast was one of the first ones, and I was on that list, and I was on the Gold Derby list, and then I heard that I wasn’t being submitted by HBO, so it was, it was a no-brainer, really.
Also as a working-class actor, I have become very familiar with being overlooked in my career, and you toughen your skin, and you just keep your head down, and you keep working, and you keep bettering yourself. And then you reach a point where you go, you know what? I don’t want to get overlooked anymore. I’m gonna stand up and stand behind my work in a meaningful way at this moment when I have an opportunity in front of me to do that, and I’m going to try to take something into my own hands in a business that can oftentimes make you feel like everything is outside of your hands.
Are you already seeing more opportunities pop up from this Emmy nomination?
I’ve been trying to get an agent in the States for months, to no avail, and I think that this nomination is proving that things might change on that front.
On social media, you posted about not being submitted by HBO and running your own “For Your Consideration” campaign ahead of the nominations. Was that actually what happened?
I worked with a publicist for a month or so, and they were lovely and hardworking, and we got a little bit of press out of our time together, but I then decided, honestly, for financial reasons more than anything, that I needed to fully look after the campaign myself, and without the support of the network or a publicist, my partner and I sat down in that final week of voting and thought, “What can we do to stir up some attention?” and we first shared one of the scenes from my audition tape, which really made the rounds online, and then secondly a post which pointed out that I was self-submitting, and it was really beautiful to see the way people rallied around that. It got the best possible outcome from sharing that, and I think it was because people had been so moved by Roxie’s storyline that they wanted to stand behind the actor who had brought that story to life.
Were you disappointed that HBO did not choose to submit you with their slate?
Yeah, I was disappointed, but you get used to disappointment as an actor, it’s not something you take personally. And I know that HBO or Warner Brothers, they have a cast of over 100 actors. That call sheet was the longest call sheet that I have ever seen. The number of actors that come to that set every day and deliver incredible work… so their job could not have been easy whittling down who they would be submitting, and of course they can’t submit everyone. So for whatever reasons I didn’t end up on that list, and yes, it stung a little initially, but as I’ve learned to do in this business, you feel that sting, and then you pick yourself up, and you keep moving forward, and you figure out, OK, what’s another angle, what’s another way in. And I’ve been so fortunate that my personal story of submitting myself resonated with so many people and has probably helped lead me to this moment.
[HBO Head Casey Bloys told THR: “The Pitt has hundreds of performers and we simply, just strategically, can’t submit everybody. It’s just the reality. But we encourage people to self-submit and I love that she got nominated.”]
Did the ‘All My Children’ Emmy’s win change anything for you?
I had been let go from All My Children because the fans were not responding to my take on that character and not only was I let go, I was recast on that show. I had just moved to L.A. with the show, and there I was without a job for nine months afterwards, and then I did end up getting nominated for my work in the last few months on that show and then went on to win. It was a microcosm of how this industry can change drastically from one day to the next. You can be an out-of-work actor, and then you can be an Emmy winner who’s getting offers and working for the next couple of years. So, it was a good lesson right away in not believing the lowest of lows and not believing the highest of highs, because people’s perceptions can change so quickly from one list that you’re on, one article, one nomination. I just remember thinking I’m still the same actor I was a week ago. I’m still bringing the same work to the table, but now suddenly people want to meet me, and I realized that you couldn’t get too attached to other people’s excitement or other people’s lack of excitement, you just had to keep pushing through and doing good work and fighting for yourself when you could.
Have you thought about how you’ll approach your Emmys campaign going forward?
The honest truth is that campaigning is an expensive venture. It costs many, many thousands of dollars to hire a publicist, to hire a stylist, to hire hair and makeup artists for all the events, and as a working-class actor who hasn’t worked since I’ve been on The Pitt, I’m not only weighing the efficacy of bringing a publicist on, when I was able to generate so much press on my own, I’m also looking at the financial implications of doing so. It’s important at every stage to invest in yourself, and it’s necessary at every stage, but at certain stages to invest more heavily in yourself, that’s just something I’m weighing right now. And I think that’s a reality that that isn’t talked about very often. So if there’s any cool women with great fashion sense who want to help a mom out who’s rocking sneakers and oversized T-Shirts these days, hit me up, please.
What do you hope comes out of this Emmy nomination?
My biggest goal with this moment is that I can use it as a jumping off point to do more roles like Roxie. I love what I do, and I was so grateful to step inside such a complex, deep, profound human in the role of Roxie, and on the set of a show like The Pitt, and when you touch that, it only makes you want to do it more. So, my hope is that the visibility that is happening in this moment, and the visibility that getting nominated for an Emmy brings any actor will allow me to step onto more sets like that and explore complex, dark, challenging female characters with great artists.
This article has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
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