2020 British Academy Television Awards


The 2020 British Academy Television Awards was held on 31 July 2020, hosted by British director and comic actor Richard Ayoade.
The nominations for the jury awards were announced on 4 June 2020, whilst the nominees for the audience award, "Virgin TV's Must-See Moments", were announced on 3 June 2020. The End of the F***ing World, Stath Lets Flats and Chernobyl each won two awards, with The End of the F***ing World taking home the Best Drama mask and Stath Lets Flats winning Best Scripted Comedy. In the news coverage awards, ITV won two masks.
The 2020 British Academy Television Craft Awards had been held on 17 July 2020. Both ceremonies were held during the COVID-19 pandemic with social distancing practices. The Craft Awards event was entirely virtual, while much of the Television Awards ceremony was connected by video call, though it was hosted and presented from an audience-less Television Centre in London. Combining wins from both events, Chernobyl set a new record for total BAFTA wins in one year, taking home nine masks from fourteen nominations. The Special Award was presented to Idris Elba.

Winners and nominees

Winners will be listed first and highlighted in boldface.
Best Drama SeriesBest Mini-Series

  • The End of the F***ing World
  • * The Crown
  • * Gentleman Jack
  • * Giri/Haji
  • Chernobyl
  • *A Confession
  • *The Victim
  • *The Virtues
    • Best Single DramaBest Soap and Continuing Drama
  • The Left Behind
  • *'
  • *Elizabeth is Missing
  • *Responsible Child
  • Emmerdale
  • *Casualty
  • *Coronation Street
  • *Holby City
    • Best ActorBest Actress
  • Jared Harris – Chernobyl as Valery Legasov
  • *Takehiro Hira – Giri/Haji as Kenzo Mori
  • *Stephen Graham – The Virtues as Joseph
  • *Callum Turner – The Capture as Shaun Amery
  • Glenda Jackson – Elizabeth is Missing as Maud
  • *Jodie Comer – Killing Eve as Villanelle
  • *Suranne Jones – Gentleman Jack as Anne Lister
  • *Samantha Morton – I Am Kirsty as Kirsty
    • Best Supporting ActorBest Supporting Actress
  • Will Sharpe – Giri/Haji as Rodney
  • *Joe Absolom – A Confession as Christopher Halliwell
  • *Josh O'Connor – The Crown as Prince Charles
  • *Stellan Skarsgård – Chernobyl as Boris Shcherbina
  • Naomi Ackie – The End of the F***ing World as Bonnie
  • *Helen Behan – The Virtues as Anna
  • *Helena Bonham Carter – The Crown as Princess Margaret
  • *Jasmine Jobson – Top Boy as Jaq
    • Best Male Comedy PerformanceBest Female Comedy Performance
  • Jamie Demetriou – Stath Lets Flats as Stath
  • *Ncuti Gatwa – Sex Education as Eric Effiong
  • *Youssef Kerkour – Home as Sami
  • *Guz Khan – Man Like Mobeen as Mobeen
  • Sian Clifford – Fleabag as Claire
  • *Gbemisola Ikumelo – Famalam as Various characters
  • *Sarah Kendall – Frayed as Sammy Cooper
  • *Phoebe Waller-Bridge – Fleabag as Fleabag
    • Best Scripted ComedyBest Comedy and Comedy Entertainment Programme
  • Stath Lets Flats
  • * Catastrophe
  • * Derry Girls
  • * Fleabag
  • Taskmaster
  • * The Graham Norton Show
  • * The Last Leg
  • * The Ranganation
    • Best Entertainment PerformanceLew Grade Award for Entertainment Programme
  • Mo Gilligan – The Lateish Show with Mo Gilligan
  • * Frankie Boyle – Frankie Boyle's New World Order
  • * Lee Mack – Would I Lie to You?
  • * Graham Norton – The Graham Norton Show
  • Strictly Come Dancing
  • * The Greatest Dancer
  • * The Rap Game UK
  • * The Voice UK
    • Best Factual Series or StrandHuw Wheldon Award for Specialist Factual
  • Leaving Neverland
  • * Crime and Punishment
  • * '
  • * Our Dementia Choir with Vicky McClure
  • Yorkshire Ripper Files: A Very British Crime Story
  • * 8 Days: To the Moon and Back
  • * Seven Worlds, One Planet
  • * Thatcher
    • Robert Flaherty Award for Single DocumentaryBest Feature
  • The Last Survivors
  • * The Abused
  • * David Harewood: Psychosis and Me
  • * The Family Secret
  • The Misadventures of Romesh Ranganathan
  • * Joe Lycett's Got Your Back
  • * Mortimer & Whitehouse
  • * Snackmasters
    • Best Reality and Constructed FactualBest Live Event
  • Race Across the World
  • * Celebrity Gogglebox
  • * '
  • * RuPaul's Drag Race UK
  • Blue Planet Live
  • * Election 2019 Live: The Results
  • * Glastonbury Festival 2019
  • * Operation Live
    • Best News CoverageBest Current Affairs
  • Hong Kong Protests
  • * ITV News at Ten: Election Results
  • * Prince Andrew & The Epstein Scandal
  • * Victoria Derbyshire: Men Who Lost Loved Ones to Knife Crime
  • Undercover: Inside China's Digital Gulag
  • * Growing Up Poor: Britain's Breadline Kids
  • * The Hunt for Jihadi John
  • * Is Labour Anti-Semitic?
    • Best SportBest Short Form Programme
  • 2019 Rugby World Cup Final: England v South Africa
  • * FIFA Women's World Cup 2019 Semi Final: England v USA
  • * ICC Cricket World Cup Final
  • * Wimbledon 2019 Men's Final
  • Brain in Gear
  • * Anywhere but Westminster
  • * Soon Gone: A Windrush Chronicle
  • * Toni with an I
    • Best International ProgrammeVirgin TV's Must-See Moment
  • When They See Us
  • * Euphoria
  • * Succession
  • * Unbelievable
  • Gavin & Stacey – "Nessa proposes to Smithy" '
  • *Coronation Street – "Death of Sinead Osbourne"
  • *Fleabag – "The Confessional Scene"
  • *Game of Thrones – "Arya kills the Night King"
  • *Line of Duty – "John Corbet's death"
  • *Love Island'' – "Michael recouples after Casa Amor"

    • Programmes with multiple nominations

    The following is a list of programmes and networks with multiple nominations at both the 2020 British Academy Television Awards and the 2020 British Academy Television Craft Awards.
    NominationsProgramme
    14Chernobyl
    7The Crown
    7Fleabag
    6Giri/Haji
    5His Dark Materials
    5The Virtues
    4Killing Eve
    4Sex Education
    4Top Boy
    3'
    3The End of the F***ing World
    3Glastonbury 2019
    3Leaving Neverland
    3Our Planet
    3Seven Worlds, One Planet
    3Stath Lets Flats
    2A Confession
    2'
    2Catherine the Great
    2Coronation Street
    2Elizabeth Is Missing
    2Game of Thrones
    2Gentleman Jack
    2The Graham Norton Show
    2The Last Survivors
    2Love Island
    2Responsible Child
    2The Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance
    2Strictly Come Dancing
    2Succession
    2"Undercover: Inside China’s Digital Gulag"
    2"Untouchable: The Rise and Fall of Harvey Weinstein"

    NominationsNetwork
    41BBC One
    33Netflix
    31Channel 4
    26BBC Two
    25HBO
    21Sky Atlantic
    17ITV
    12BBC Three
    7Sony Pictures Television
    3BBC Four
    2Channel 5
    2ITV2

    Most major wins

    The following is a list of programmes and networks with multiple wins at both the 2020 British Academy Television Awards and Television Craft Awards.
    WinsShow
    9Chernobyl
    3Stath Lets Flats
    2The End of the F***ing World
    2The Last Survivors
    2Strictly Come Dancing

    WinsNetwork
    10BBC One
    10Sky Atlantic
    8Channel 4
    5BBC Two
    4Netflix
    3ITV
    2BBC Three

    Ceremony

    Nominations for the 2020 British Academy Television Awards were announced on 4 June 2020. Fleabag, Chernobyl, Giri/Haji and The Crown had the most nominations. The ceremony had originally been scheduled for 17 May 2020; though it was postponed, the qualification dates for eligible programming were not changed. Krishnendu Majumdar, the chair of BAFTA since June 2020, gave an announcement that it was important to celebrate the importance of television during the COVID-19 pandemic.
    The ceremony was held on 31 July 2020 from 19:00 BST, the first major award show since the start of the pandemic. It was hosted by Richard Ayoade from a studio in Television Centre, London. Several performers presented individual awards in-studio, while other presenters and all the winners and nominees contributed over video either live or pre-recorded. This led to the interesting acceptance speech of Naomi Ackie, whose immediate reaction was to text people while live on video call – something for which she was humorously berated by presenter Himesh Patel. Other presenters at the ceremony included Aisling Bea, Greg Davies, Stacey Dooley, Jessica Hynes, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Jeff Goldblum, Ruth Madeley, Paul Mescal, Chris O'Dowd, Billy Porter, Michael Sheen, Nina Sosanya, David Tennant, and Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy. Tim Minchin composed two original comedy musical numbers, which he performed at the start and end of the ceremony. An hour-long pre-show hosted by Tom Allen had been streamed on social media prior to the ceremony. Rotten Tomatoes' editorial on the event wrote that the ceremony "held all the drama of regular awards shows, regardless of location, mostly due to some big surprises".
    Surprise results included both the Best Drama and Best Scripted Comedy winners: The End of the F***ing World won drama over favourite The Crown, while Stath Lets Flats won comedy instead of the much-celebrated Fleabag. Additionally, Phoebe Waller-Bridge lost Best Female Comedy Performance to her Fleabag co-star Sian Clifford. The two Fleabag stars watched the ceremony together at Waller-Bridge's house but separated on video for their nominations to prevent audio feedback. After Clifford won the award, Waller-Bridge presented her with a statuette of the "Godmother", an item in the show. During her acceptance speech, Clifford confirmed that the jury discussions for the year's awards were also done via video calls, and – speaking in the virtual backstage after winning – Clifford joked with Allen about the BAFTA award, a mask, being used as a facemask in public. Fleabag won only one award from the four for which it was nominated.
    The HBO/Sky Atlantic drama Chernobyl won for two of its three nominations, having won many awards in the BAFTA Television Craft Awards held virtually earlier in the month. The two wins on top of seven at the Craft Awards increased the show's BAFTA total to a new record of nine in one year. The Best Actor winner for his role in Chernobyl, Jared Harris, said to reporters in the 'backstage' video call after his win: " incredibly generous of BAFTA, to award that many. I mean, one of the things that I've noticed about the BAFTA awards over the years is, they're pretty judicious about spreading the love". The Best Soap and Continuing Drama award was won by Emmerdale, with its executive producer Jane Hudson saying in her acceptance speech that all the soaps deserved recognition as they had already restarted shooting by the summer of 2020. As Best Actress, Glenda Jackson won her second BAFTA, having taken home her first over 25 years ago. Other winners were notably diverse, with first-time winners Will Sharpe and Naomi Ackie being named Best Supporting Actor and Actress, respectively. The BAFTA Special Award was presented to Idris Elba for his contributions in creating opportunities in the industry; the award was introduced by Taraji P. Henson, Matthew McConaughey, Ruth Wilson, and Grace Fori-Attah.

    In Memoriam

    Sydney Lotterby, who died a few days before the ceremony, was not included in the montage but was named by Ayoade afterwards. The In Memoriam segment covered deaths in the 15 months since the last ceremony. A further "In Memory Of..." list, including international figures, was included on the BAFTA website.