UK drama is top of the world in Emmy Awards

The high quality of British television drama was underlined yesterday when the industry secured more nominations than any other country for this year's International Emmy Awards.

Victoria Wood was nominated for the double Bafta award-winner Housewife, 49, which she wrote and starred in and which depicted the wartime experiences, related in letters to the Mass Observation project, of a housewife from Barrow-in-Furness.

Jimmy McGovern's The Street, which follows the lives of the residents of a single road, secured two nominations. It will contest the best drama series award, while the Oscar-winning Jim Broadbent is among the contenders for best actor for his role in the series as an embittered pensioner. Stephen Fry's The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive, in which he explored his own and other people's experiences of living with bipolar disorder, is nominated in the documentary category.

The country to garner the next most impressive collection of nominations was Brazil, with seven, followed by Japan (four), South Africa (three) and Germany, Denmark, China and the Netherlands (two each).

The 38 nominees in nine categories were announced by the International Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in Cannes. Although the UK leads the nominations this year, it has not come close to matching last year's tally of 17, when UK programmes won six prizes, including Ray Winstone (best actor for Vincent) and Life on Mars (best drama series).

Winners of the awards, which honour television produced outside the US, will be revealed on 19 November in New York.