The fifth and final season of Hacks has gone into the 2026 Emmy Awards with a record 24 nominations for the HBO Max comedy, as stars Jean Smart and Hannah Einbinder close out the series that turned them into two of television's most decorated performers.
Hacks follows Deborah Vance (Smart), an aging Las Vegas comedy star coasting toward her final show, who discovers she shares a talent manager with Ava Daniels (Einbinder), a millennial writer who has just been "canceled" on social media over a joke about the sexuality of a United States senator. Ava, progressive and bisexual, does not want to leave Los Angeles but ends up writing new material for a star she believes should be paying more tax on her fortune, a setup that launched the show's first season.
At a press conference for the season's premiere that La Republica attended, Smart said the fourth season had gotten a little dark and that she worried viewers would end up hating her character. She said audiences cared enough about the relationship between Deborah and Ava that they were willing to follow it anywhere, but that season five goes back to being deeply silly, which she called a lot of fun. Smart, 74, has won four Emmys for the role and is considered a frontrunner again this year.
"Easier to get elected president"
Early in her career, Deborah Vance wanted to become the first woman to host a late-night talk show. In one season she says the network had never hired a woman for the 11:30 slot, nor anyone her age, nor, frankly, a blonde, and that it would be easier to get elected president. In Hacks, Ava pushes the veteran star to revisit that dream with different material, though once back on top, Deborah insists on keeping control of both the show and her writer. Einbinder, 31, said the pair keep clashing throughout the season, something she said they also enjoyed enormously. She won a Television Academy award for the season that premiered in 2025.
One of the show's strengths is how consistently it ties its story to real shifts inside the entertainment industry. In one scene set at a golf course, Ava is mistaken for an assistant and invited into a private suite, then storms out accusing the woman, whom she calls "Republican," of abusing her power.
At the same press conference, Smart addressed the large media companies now deciding who gets a platform and whose voice can be silenced. She described the industry as living through a strange and turbulent moment in which big corporations are taking control of decisions, calling it frightening. She said she and a producing partner had been discussing a project and had to stop to ask themselves whether it would be well received by more conservative powers, calling it a very strange time. She said Deborah is pushed to her limit this season, and that it may be the first time viewers see her, even briefly, completely defeated.
Einbinder called the pair's first interview scene one of the most iconic moments in the whole series and the foundation of their characters' connection, describing how strange it feels watching them sit on those couches and then walk away from each other. Smart said she never asked how the series would end, adding that she loved being surprised in every episode over the years.
Queer icon and comedy's reigning star
Smart said there are now more interesting roles for women over 25 than there were decades ago. She said men remain dominant across film, with roughly ten male roles for every female one, but that writers used to focus almost exclusively on men because they were seen as the ones out in the world doing things. She said people gradually realized women had always been out there too, and writers began telling stories about women who were unusual, rebellious and ahead of their time. She added that the industry is now recognizing that older women characters can be just as three-dimensional, with the same desires, as women in their thirties.
Hacks has also become one of the television productions most engaged with diversity. Einbinder, who is openly bisexual, said the show has created characters admired by the LGBTI community.
Einbinder has spoken out against the State of Israel and has voiced support for a boycott of institutions she describes as complicit in genocide.
Einbinder said she considers Deborah Vance a queer icon, pointing to a scene between actors Tim Bagley and Carl Clemons-Hopkins in a Palm Springs bar as one of the most striking depictions the show has offered of what it means to love a diva and to support someone before they win over the general public. She said Ava is the product of queer writers who built a vivid, authentic character, and that when she first read the role on the page she thought it was a fully realized human being with no cliches and no parody, something she said only happens when people write from their own experience. She added that the character always comes out ahead.
Smart and Einbinder on AI in scriptwriting
Because the comedy is also a tribute to the art of reinvention, Smart and Einbinder were asked about the growing use of artificial intelligence in screenwriting. Smart said she has read that the technology is shrinking people's imagination, which she finds frightening. Einbinder said AI systems are not artists and are not creative, and that they are trying to take gifts away from genuinely creative people, adding that anyone drawn to the technology is chasing power and access above any ethical standard.
Hacks premiered in 2021. Smart could become a television legend, as she stands to be the only actress to win an Emmy for every season of a single series. The final season premiered on April 9 on HBO Max and runs for 10 episodes. Across its run, Hacks has amassed 86 Emmy nominations and 12 wins.
