Fleabag stuns again, wins Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series

This news should make Phoebe Waller-Bridge turn to camera and smile conspiratorially. Fleabag scored an underdog upset at the 71st Emmy Awards, winning the Outstanding Comedy Series trophy on Sunday. It’s an impressive feat, considering the competition from Veep (which had won the previous three seasons it was eligible) and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (which claimed the prize last year).

The Amazon comedy starring Waller-Bridge as a finding-her-way guinea-pig-café owner, which some pundits saw as a dangerous threat to the incumbents, debuted in the summer of 2016. Season 2, which premiered in April, will be the show’s last, according to Waller-Bridge, who also was the brains behind Killing Eve. She was nominated in the writing and acting categories for Fleabag, which received 11 nominations overall.

Waller-Bridge pulled off an even bigger upset in the Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series, edging out Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who had won all previous six seasons. She also won in the writing category, while the show nabbed the directing category, too.

In the press room after the win, Waller-Bridge talked about how the wins were a perfect send-off for the show. “To be honest, this feels like the most beautiful way to say goodbye to it actually. It does feel like the story is complete,” Waller-Bridge told reporters. “It’s so nice to hear that so many people loved it, but it does feel right. We’re going out on a high. You can’t get higher than this.”

“It’s not autobiographical, but it’s really personal,” she said of the sharp, confessional, insubordinate little series. “This character did come out of me, and at the very beginning I was quite cynical and bleak about the world and writing her was a really cathartic way of getting through that. It feels like it’s all of us now.”

Fleabag was competing against Veep, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, The Good Place, Russian Doll, Schitt’s Creek, and Barry. See the full list of 2019 Emmy Award winners.

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