In a development straight out of “Succession,” Jeremy Strong has usurped his TV pops Brian Cox for the top spot in our Best Drama Actor odds with less than a week to go before the Emmys.
Strong now stands at 19/5 odds to 4/1 for Cox, who had held the No. 1 spot since Phase 1. They each have 11 Experts backing them, but Strong has five Editors to four for Cox, and 13 of our top 24 users to just nine for Cox.
This is the first time the the duo will face off against one another at an awards show; Cox won the Golden Globe in January, but Strong wasn’t nominated, and vice versa at the Critics’ Choice Awards. Strong also nabbed a Television Critics Association Award nomination while Cox didn’t make the cut the single gender-neutral category.
They are the 17th pair of co-stars to be nominated in the drama actor category, and with “Succession” being the drama series front-runner and having scored a leading nine acting bids, it feels like the show is strong (no pun intended) enough to pull off a victory here, vote-splitting be damned. Their fellow nominee Sterling K. Brown — who told Gold Derby last month he thinks Strong will win — overcame it three years ago, beating his “This Is Us” dad Milo Ventimiglia for the same prize.
This time around, Brown is in sixth place at 13/2, well back behind the top two, as are the other three contenders. Jason Bateman (“Ozark”) is closest in third at 9/2, followed by reigning champ Billy Porter (“Pose”) at 11/2 and Steve Carell (“The Morning Show”) also at 13/2. Carell is the only one in this lineup who can continue the weird nine-year trend of the award going to a first-year show or a final-year show.
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