UPDATED with full winners list: The 2022 Writers Guild Awards handed Adam McKay’s script for the end-of-the-world satire Don’t Look Up its Original Screenplay award and Siân Heder’s CODA its Adapted Screenplay award Sunday in a virtual ceremony honoring the best in film, TV, new media, news, radio and promotional categories.
The awards show also saw double wins on the TV side for Hacks, which took both the Comedy Series and New Series categories, matching Ted Lasso‘s feat from last year. Succession also won twice, sweeping Drama Series and Episodic Drama. 60 Minutes was another double winner tonight.
In the film race, Don’t Look Up scored over its fellow Oscar nominees King Richard and Licorice Pizza (Pizza won at the BAFTAs last week), along with Being the Ricardos and The French Dispatch. It’s the third WGA honor for McKay, who shared story credit on the pic with David Sirota; McKay won WGA trophies in 2016 for co-writing The Big Short and in 2010 for his work on Saturday Night Live.
Belfast, the other Oscar nominee in the original category, was not eligible for the WGA Award tonight, and neither was Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog (the leading Oscar nominee this year) and Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Lost Daughter (which won the predictive USC Scripter Award) on the adapted side. That left the door open for CODA, which also won at the BAFTAs last week.
Last year at the WGAs, Emerald Fennell’s Promising Young Woman won the Original Screenplay category while the team behind Borat Subsequent Moviefilm won for Adapted Screenplay. Promising Young Woman went on to take the Oscar in the same category; Borat was nominated for an Oscar but missed out, with The Father eventually taking the Academy Award.
Other key wins tonight included The Great for Episodic Comedy. In long form, Maid won for adapted and Emmy winner Mare of Easttown won for original. Conan, in its last season, won for Comedy/Variety Talk Series, its first WGA win in its last chance at the trophy.
The WGA also bestowed a pair of honorary awards in the ceremony, hosted by Ted Lasso and Black Lady Sketch Show‘s Ashley Nicole Black. Barry Jenkins accepted the WGAW’s Paul Selvin Award for the episode “Chapter 9: Indiana Winter” of Amazon’s The Underground Railroad. The award is given to “the script that best embodies the spirit of the constitutional and civil rights and liberties that are indispensable to the survival of free writers everywhere.”
Late-night icon Dick Cavett received WGAE’s Evelyn F. Burkey Award, given for contributions that have brought honor and dignity to writers everywhere.
Here’s the full list of winners:
FILM
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Don’t Look Up
Screenplay by Adam McKay, Story by Adam McKay & David Sirota; Netflix
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
CODA
Screenplay by Siân Heder, Based on the Original Motion Picture La Famille Belier Directed by Eric Lartigau, Written by Victoria Bedos, Stanislas Carree de Malberg, Eric Lartigau and Thomas Bidegain; Apple
DOCUMENTARY SCREENPLAY
Exposing Muybridge
Written by Marc Shaffer; Inside Out Media
TELEVISION AND NEW MEDIA
DRAMA SERIES
Succession
Written by Jesse Armstrong, Jon Brown, Jamie Carragher, Ted Cohen, Francesca Gardiner, Lucy Prebble, Georgia Pritchett, Tony Roche, Susan Soon He Stanton, Will Tracy; HBO/HBO Max
COMEDY SERIES
Hacks
Written by Genevieve Aniello, Lucia Aniello, Joanna Calo, Jessica Chaffin, Paul W. Downs, Jess Dweck, Cole Escola, Janis Hirsch, Ariel Karlin, Katherine Kearns, Andrew Law, Joe Mande, Pat Regan, Samantha Riley, Michael Schur, Jen Statsky; HBO/HBO Max
NEW SERIES
Hacks
Written by Genevieve Aniello, Lucia Aniello, Joanna Calo, Jessica Chaffin, Paul W. Downs, Jess Dweck, Cole Escola, Janis Hirsch, Ariel Karlin, Katherine Kearns, Andrew Law, Joe Mande, Pat Regan, Samantha Riley, Michael Schur, Jen Statsky; HBO/HBO Max
ORIGINAL LONG FORM
Mare of Easttown
Written by Brad Ingelsby; HBO/HBO Max
ADAPTED LONG FORM
Maid
Written by Bekah Brunstetter, Marcus Gardley, Michelle Denise Jackson, Colin McKenna, Molly Smith Metzler, Inspired by the book by Stephanie Land; Netflix
ORIGINAL & ADAPTED SHORT FORM NEW MEDIA
Debunking Borat
Written by Robyn Adams, Paul Hogan, Jack Youngelson; Prime Video
ANIMATION
“Planteau” (Tuca & Bertie)
Written by Lisa Hanawalt; Cartoon Network
EPISODIC DRAMA
“Retired Janitors of Idaho” (Succession)
Written by Tony Roche & Susan Soon He Stanton; HBO/HBO Max
EPISODIC COMEDY
“Alone At Last” (The Great)
Written by Tony McNamara; Hulu
COMEDY/VARIETY TALK SERIES
Conan
Head Writer: Matt O’Brien Writers: Jose Arroyo, Glenn Boozan, Daniel Cronin, Andres du Bouchet, Jessie Gaskell, Skyler Higley, Brian Kiley, Laurie Kilmartin, Todd Levin, Levi MacDougall, Conan O’Brien, Andy Richter, Frank Smiley, Mike Sweeney; TBS
COMEDY/VARIETY SKETCH SERIES
I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson
Writers: Zach Kanin, Tim Robinson, John Solomon; Netflix
COMEDY/VARIETY SPECIALS
Full Frontal Wants to Take Your Guns
Head Writers: Kristen Bartlett, Mike Drucker Writers: Samantha Bee, Pat Cassels, Sean Crespo, Miles Kahn, Chris Thompson, Holly Walker, Alison Zeidman Writing Supervised by Joe Grossman, Sahar Rizvi Special Material by Michael Rhoa; TBS
QUIZ AND AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION
Baking It
Writers: Neil Casey, Jessica McKenna, Zach Reino, Niccole Thurman; Peacock
DAYTIME DRAMA
Days of Our Lives
Head Writer: Ron Carlivati Writers: Lorraine Broderick, Joanna Cohen, Carolyn Culliton, Richard Culliton, Jamey Giddens, David Kreizman, Rebecca McCarty, Ryan Quan, Dave Ryan, Katherine D. Schock, Elizabeth Snyder; NBC
CHILDREN’S EPISODIC, LONG FORM AND SPECIALS
“The Tale of the Midnight Magic” (Are You Afraid of the Dark?)
Written by JT Billings and Alex Ebel; Nickelodeon
DOCUMENTARY SCRIPT – CURRENT EVENTS
“The Healthcare Divide” (Frontline)
Written by Rick Young; PBS
DOCUMENTARY SCRIPT – OTHER THAN CURRENT EVENTS
“Citizen Hearst, Part One” (American Experience)
Written by Gene Tempest; PBS
NEWS SCRIPT – REGULARLY SCHEDULED, BULLETIN, OR BREAKING REPORT
“The Unequal Recession” (60 Minutes)
Written by Katie Kerbstat Jacobson, Scott Pelley, Nicole Young; CBS News
NEWS SCRIPT – ANALYSIS, FEATURE, OR COMMENTARY
“Handcuffed to the Truth” (60 Minutes)
Written by Katie Kerbstat Jacobson, Scott Pelley, Nicole Young; CBS News
DIGITAL NEWS
“‘Men’s Rights Asians’ Think This Is Their Moment”
Written by Aaron Mak; Slate.com
RADIO/AUDIO WINNERS
RADIO/AUDIO DOCUMENTARY
“One Year: 1977 ‘The Miracle Cure’”
Written by Evan Chung; Slate Podcast
RADIO/AUDIO NEWS SCRIPT—REGULARLY SCHEDULED, BULLETIN, OR BREAKING REPORT
“Surfside Condo Collapse” (CBS World News Roundup Late Edition)
Written by Kathleen M. Biggins; CBS News Radio
RADIO/AUDIO NEWS SCRIPT – ANALYSIS, FEATURE, OR COMMENTARY
“The Tasmanian Devil Tattoo” (Decoder Ring)
Written by Benjamin Frisch; Slate Podcast
PROMOTIONAL
ON-AIR PROMOTION
“Celebrating Powerful Female Leads: Trailers for The Equalizer & Why Women Kill”
Written by Molly Neylan; CBS
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