Deadline's Mike Fleming Finds Himself in a Familiar Awards Season Spot

Ahead of Friday's 53rd annual ICG Publicists Awards luncheon at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles, here's a little trivia for the Press award category. Deadline's chief film critic Pete Hammond has won the award twice, in 2013 and 1996, making him the only person besides former L.A. Times staffer Charles Champlin to manage that twin feat since the awards were first presented in 1964. One of the people he beat out in 2013 was his editor in chief Mike Fleming Jr., who is nominated once again this year. It's Fleming's fifth nomination; he's still angling for his first win. Per Deadline managing editor Patrick Hipes, Hammond 'never lets Mike forget’ the Press award discrepancy. And when Fleming notched his fifth nomination for this year's event, Hipes playfully urged readers to 'insert your best Susan Lucci jokes here.' Should Fleming win tomorrow, he will also join a pair of colleagues at sister publication Variety. Brian Lowry and Claudia Eller won the Press award respectively in 1998 and 1993. The very first such award, in 1964, was handed out to longtime Hollywood Reporter and Billboard editor Don Carle Gillette. Competing with Fleming this year are: USA Today's Bryan Alexander; People and EW editor Jess Cagle; EW's Jeff Jensen; and TV Guide's Rob Moynihan. There is also an International Media award to be handed out, with nominees this year being: Nelson Aspen (Australia); Dan Jolin (U.K.); Elisabeth Sereda (Austria); Noel de Souza (India); and Yuko Yoshikawa (Japan). We imagine that the HR folks at PMC have two cakes with customized icing lettering in the offing. One if Fleming wins; and another if he goes 0-for-5. Correction (3:30 p.m.): The original version of this item ended with a mention that Hammond was nominated in the Press category last year alongside Fleming. That is incorrect. In fact, a reader kindly informed us that once a winner, journalists cannot be nominated again in the category for 10 years. FishbowlNY apologizes for the error. Update (Feb. 26): The "Lucci" luck continued today for Fleming: USA Today's Bryan Alexander wins The Press Award at #publicistsawards and says simply, "thank you!" pic.twitter.com/JPnLHHO66X— prmaven (@prmaven) February 26, 2016 Comedian Yakov Smirnov with International Media Award winner Yuko Yoshikawa, of Japan. #PublicistsAwards pic.twitter.com/3JWlzCNdIt— IATSE Local 600 (@ICGLocal600) February 26, 2016

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Deadline's Mike Fleming Finds Himself in a Familiar Awards Season Spot

ICG Publicists Awards nominee is hoping the fifth time will be the charm.

Richard Horgan

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Richard Horgan