‘The Andy Griffith Show’: Only These 2 Cast Members Won Emmy Awards

For a comedy series that ran for eight seasons and has been enjoyed by generation after generation of viewers, The Andy Griffith Show surprisingly didn’t rake in a great deal of awards, particularly Emmy awards.

Here are the only two actors from the enduring program that have been honored with the statuette.

‘The Andy Griffith Show’ debuted 60 years ago

Premiering in October 1960, The Andy Griffith Show was a hit right from the start. Up until its final season in 1968, the series was consistently in the Nielsen top 10. Something about Mayberry and its friendly townspeople appealed to viewers.

Andy Griffith, speaking with the Archive of American Television in 1998, said “We didn’t know when we started it that it was going to last that long, or influence so many people. We were just trying to do a good show.

“It was family-oriented, it was about a little town and all the people who lived in it. As [show director] Bob Sweeney used to say, ‘It looks like an ordinary little town but it has a little border of insanity around it.'”

Andy Griffith never won an Emmy

Although his name was on the show and he had proven himself as a strong actor and writer on the program, Andy Griffith was never even nominated for the honor for the Griffith Show.

His only Emmy nomination was for Outstanding Supporting Actor for his role in the 1981 television film Murder in Texas. The actor was finally honored by the Television Academy with a Hall of Fame award in 1992.

“Andy had never won an Emmy, an Oscar, or a Tony,” wrote Daniel de Visé, author of Andy and Don: The Making of a Friendship and a Classic American TV Show.

“Yet, he had attained a celebrity that transcended those honors. Like Lucille Ball or Johnny Carson, Andy had connected with American society to its core. The Andy Griffith Show had shaped popular culture.”

The 2 cast members who won Emmy Awards

Of the entire cast of the comedy, only the show’s Aunt Bee actor Frances Bavier and Don Knotts were Emmy winners.

Bavier won an Emmy award in 1967 for Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.

But the big winner was Don Knotts, who took home five Emmys for his Supporting Actor role as Barney Fife on the show. His wins took place in 1961, 1962, 1963, 1966, and 1967, the last two awards going to Knotts for his guest appearances on the Griffith show.

De Visé in his book touched on Griffith’s lack of Emmys while Knotts boasted an armful of awards, stating that it was a topic not discussed between the two men.

“Don’s Emmys were the one subject Andy would not broach with his old friend,” de Visé wrote. “In all their years together on the Griffith Show, Don later recalled, Andy never acknowledged Don’s trophies or offered congratulations. It was too painful a topic.”

For his part, Griffith told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, according to de Visé, “I’ve never won anything in my life and I don’t expect to. I’m not angry about that. It would be nice to have one when my mother comes over. But I can manage without it.”