Claire Foy poised to score Emmy hattrick for ‘The Crown’
Claire Foy became a household name thanks to her starring role as Queen Elizabeth in Netflix’s “The Crown.” Foy was perhaps the best thing about the lush Netflix show, which charted various eras and dramas of the royal family, beginning with Queen Elizabeth’s coronation.
Foy starred in the leading role in the first two seasons of “The Crown” opposite Matt Smith as Prince Philip. She was nominated for Best Drama Actress for both of those seasons, winning for season two. She then left the show as “The Crown” recasts every two seasons, with characters undergoing age transitions. She returned in the fourth and fifth seasons, however, as a guest actress. She won a second Emmy for season four, for Best Drama Guest Actress.
Foy returned in the sixth and final season of the show, which takes place between 1997 and 2005 and depicts the death of Princess Diana (Elizabeth Debicki), the premiership of Tony Blair (Bertie Carvel) as Prime Minister, and the wedding of Prince Charles (Dominic West) and Camilla Parker Bowles (Olivia Williams). Meanwhile, Imelda Staunton features as Queen Elizabeth. However, it’s the return of Foy as a younger version of the Queen that caught fans’ attention the most.
She features in the final ever episode of “The Crown” in the season’s 10th installment. As Staunton’s Queen deals with several issues, including whether to allow Charles and Camilla to marry, she encounters visions of her past self. These take the form of Foy and Olivia Colman, who played the Queen in seasons three and four. As the younger version of the Queen, Foy’s Elizabeth encourages Staunton’s Queen to continue on the throne and resist the temptation of abdication.
Foy slips seamlessly back into the role she was born for, capturing the youthful spirit of the fresh-faced Queen. Her role is contrasted nicely with Staunton’s portrayal of an older, more stony-faced Queen. Foy’s mannerisms and facial expressions are all on point once again, reminding us just how good she was in the role to begin with. And critics agree.
Lili Loofbourow (The Washington Post) wrote: “Foy and Colman excelled at showing Elizabeth at war with herself, struggling to suppress her personal reactions.”
Meghan O’Keefe (Decider) opined: “Viral photo aside, the return of Claire Foy’s young Queen Elizabeth II and Olivia Colman’s middle-aged monarch to ‘The Crown’ lends an air of tragedy to the show’s final episode… Foy and Colman’s scenes also underscore how the character of Elizabeth II has evolved over the course of ‘The Crown”s six year run from bright young thing to a tired public servant embracing her own twilight. Claire Foy and Olivia Colman’s final Crown appearances are way more than just a marketing moment.”
Dana Feldman (Forbes) observed: “Foy played her in seasons one and two, Colman took over in seasons three and four, and Staunton portrays the Queen in seasons five and six. All three performances are flawless.”
We are predicting that Foy will be nominated again for Best Drama Guest Actress this year alongside Yuko Miyamoto (“Shōgun”) and four “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” actresses in Sarah Paulson, Michaela Coel, Marcia Gay Harden, and Sharon Horgan. However, we actually think that Foy will win this award, which would bring her Emmys total to three wins — all for “The Crown.”
She was nominated for Best Drama Actress in 2017 (losing to Elisabeth Moss in “The Handmaid’s Tale”) and in 2018. She won in the latter year. Then, she took home the award for Best Drama Guest Actress in 2021. So, not only do we know that Emmy voters like Foy, we know that they like Foy as Queen Elizabeth, and we also know that they like Foy as Queen in Elizabeth in a guest-acting capacity. That is some cold, hard proof that suggests Foy is very much on voters’ radars. And why wouldn’t she be? Emmy voters love “The Crown.”
So far, the show has won a whopping 21 Emmys. Being involved in a show this beloved will always help your chances no matter what. But let’s dig a little deeper into Emmy voters’ love for this show. They specifically adore the performances, having awarded “The Crown” 18 nominations in total for its various actors’ roles. That is an incredible number. Season one garnered two bids, season two reaped four nominations, season three received two bids, season four was greeted with a huge nine nominations, and season five picked up one citation for acting.
Currently, we think that “The Crown” season six will be nominated for Best Drama Series, Best Drama Actress for Staunton, Best Drama Actor for West, Best Drama Supporting Actress for Debicki and Lesley Manville, Best Drama Supporting Actor for Jonathan Pryce and Khalid Abdalla. That’s seven major Emmy nominations we think it will receive, so Foy seems like a natural fit for another nomination here.
So far, every season of “The Crown” bar season five has garnered at least one nomination for an actress playing Queen Elizabeth. In 2021, it earned two — to go with Foy’s guest-acting bid, Olivia Colman won Best Drama Actress. The same pair of nominations (for actors playing the same category) could well happen again this year if Staunton and Foy are both nominated. And they may well be because, as Foy’s two returns have proved — no matter how many new casts are unveiled or big names join the show, Foy is and always will be the face of “The Crown.” She is the one who launched the show with her stunning performance and voters haven’t forgotten that.
Plus, the guest-acting categories are full of actors appearing as characters they previously made their name as in a larger capacity. Jessica Lange was nominated for Best Drama Guest Actress for “American Horror Story: Apocalypse” in 2019 (Cherry Jones won that year for “The Handmaid’s Tale”) for playing Constance Langdon, a role she originated in the very first season of “American Horror Story,” which won her Best TV Movie/Limited Series Supporting Actress in 2012. In the same category in 2018, Viola Davis was nominated for playing Annalise Keating in “Scandal” (Samira Wiley won for “The Handmaid’s Tale”), a role that won her the Best Drama Actress Emmy in 2015 for “How to Get Away With Murder.” And Don Cheadle was nominated for Best Drama Guest Actor in 2021 (losing to Courtney B. Vance for “Lovecraft Country”) for his role as James Rhodes in “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier,” a character he played multiple times in various MCU movies beforehand. Foy proved this route to be successful herself with her own guest-acting win but she could repeat it here.
Make your predictions at Gold Derby now. Download our free and easy app for Apple/iPhone devices or Android (Google Play) to compete against legions of other fans plus our experts and editors for best prediction accuracy scores. See our latest prediction champs. Can you top our esteemed leaderboards next? Always remember to keep your predictions updated because they impact our latest racetrack odds, which terrify Hollywood chiefs and stars. Don’t miss the fun. Speak up and share your huffy opinions in our famous forums where 5,000 showbiz leaders lurk every day to track latest awards buzz. Everybody wants to know: What do you think? Who do you predict and why?