TV Pick of the week: Emmy Awards

High-school comedy Glee has been nominated 19 times in this year's Emmy Awards. Photo / Supplied

Where: Vibe
When: Monday from midday

Teen favourite Glee leads the pack with 19 Emmy Award nominations. If life was like a TV show, the young misfit characters from Glee would burst into song at the Emmy Awards, wow the audience, and dance off with the coveted best comedy series trophy after one triumphant season.

Yet, although the madcap but dark musical comedy goes into this year's most prestigious awards show with a leading 19 nominations, victory for Glee at the Emmy Awards ceremony is far from a foregone conclusion.

"Just because a show has the most buzz across America, it doesn't mean that translates into Hollywood circles," says veteran awards watcher Tom O'Neil of website TheEnvelope.com.

That's because Emmy voters tend to be older and more conservative than the fans that have helped make the Fox high-school comedy the most-talked-about TV show of the year.

Although Glee is a leading contender for the best comedy Emmy - and actress Jane Lynch is seen as a shoo-in to win best supporting comedy actress for her role as scheming cheerleading coach Sue Sylvester - the quirky show faces a tough challenge from the more traditional Modern Family (14 nominations) and three-time Emmy champion 30 Rock.

"If you ask most American TV lovers, they think Glee is going to win; if you ask most Hollywood insiders they would say Modern Family, but if you ask Emmy historians they would probably say 30 Rock has the edge. It's a fascinating match-up," O'Neil said.

Modern Family already won three technical awards in the "creative arts" portion of the Emmys last week, with a haul of two for Glee, including an Emmy for guest star Neil Patrick Harris.

Whatever the outcome, Emmy Awards night is expected to feature a fresh and more populist line-up of winners than in the past two years, where cable shows and repeat winners have dominated, industry watchers say.

Five of the 12 best comedy and drama series nominees are first-timers, in what is seen as a shot in the arm for the industry at a time of fierce competition from other media.

The admired-but-little-seen 1960s advertising series Mad Men may be out in front in drama with 17 nods, including coveted best drama series. But it faces a challenge to its two-year reign from the lawyer drama The Good Wife and the ambitious sci-fi mystery series Lost, which ended its six-year run in May. And don't dismiss serial-killer drama Dexter, or HBO's edgy adult vampire series True Blood.

Former ER star Julianna Margulies is seen as favorite to win the best drama actress Emmy for playing the stoic spouse of a disgraced public official in The Good Wife - one of the highest-rated new shows on US television.

Edie Falco is seen as having a strong shot at adding a best comedy Emmy to her three-trophy haul for the drama series The Sopranos.

She plays a subversive, drug-addicted nurse in the dark drama-comedy Nurse Jackie.

- TimeOut