What are the Creative Arts Emmys and why were winners announced ahead of the Emmys broadcast?

Award season has officially begun, as the first round of Emmys was awarded over the weekend.

The Creative Arts Emmys awarded 99 Emmys to actors, creatives, and producers, throughout a variety of programming across the industry.

The Creative Arts Emmys air every year the weekend before the Primetime Emmys that we all know and love. The winners are typically announced across two nights, this year taking place on Saturday, September 7, and Sunday, September 8.

This award show doesn’t typically air live on television like many others, instead, an edited version will air on FXX on September 14, as a lead-up to the Primetime Emmys.

The actual awards presented at the Creative Arts Emmys aren’t actually any different from the Primetime Emmy Awards, but according to the Television Academy, the two-night event is meant to “celebrate exceptional artistic and technical achievements in television.”

The main purpose of this award ceremony is to award Emmys to categories they may not have time for in the regular Primetime Emmy show. Award shows throughout the year frequently have pre-show ceremonies or awards during commercial breaks, because not everything can fit into the two or three-hour primetime window.

And with 99 awards to give out across two days at the Creative Arts Emmys alone, it makes sense that they couldn’t squeeze everything into the regular show.

The star-studded cast of presenters for the weekend’s events included Ted Lasso‘s Hannah Waddingham, Lucy Liu, comedian Nikki Glaser, Jane Lynch, Vanderpump Rules‘s Ariana Madix and Katie Maloney, Dancing with the Stars’s Maksim Chmerkovskiy, and the casts of Shark Tank and Love on the Spectrum.

Despite the award show being little-known and untelevised, big awards were presented this weekend. Jamie Lee Curtis one her first Emmy for Best Comedy Actress in The Bear, Angela Bassett earned her first Emmy after nine nominations for Outstanding Narration on National Geographic’s documentary Queens, and Pat Sajak won an Emmy for his final season hosting Wheel of Fortune.

The Creative Arts Emmys also awards cinematography, choreography, casting, hair and makeup, animated programming, visual effects, writing, sound mixing, children’s programming, hosting, and even main title design. All of the behind-the-scenes work that you don’t even think about in your favorite TV shows, is recognized at the Creative Arts Emmys.

If you want to tune in and see all 99 winners, you can watch on FXX the night before the Primetime Emmys.

The Primetime Emmys, which includes most of the big-ticket awards, will air on September 15 at 8 PM EST on ABC.