MTV goes gender neutral for Movie and TV awards

MTV is scrapping male and female categories to make this year's Movie and TV Awards gender neutral.

The revamped awards will no longer be awarding prizes for best actor and best actress as is traditional, but will instead merge men and women in communal categories.

It means Emma Watson will compete with Hugh Jackman and James McAvoy for best actor in a movie at this year's awards, while Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown and Emilia Clarke from Game Of Thrones will go up against The Walking Dead's Jeffrey Dean Morgan for best actor in a show.

Earlier this week, gender non-binary actor Asia Kate Dillon, who was born a woman but does not identify as either male or female, raised the issue of division at award ceremonies.

After being nominated for an Emmy award, the actor wrote to the Television Academy about the issue, asking why it was necessary to "denote anatomy or identity".

Organisers wrote back saying "anyone can submit under either category for any reason", and asked Dillon to choose the preferred category.

The Billions star chose best supporting actor, arguing "actor" is generally seen as a non-gendered word.

The Academy Awards, Golden Globes, Emmys and Baftas all still have have separate categories for men and women, however music awards ceremony the Grammys has always had non-gendered categories.

As well as the gender-free categories, MTV has also introduced five new gongs this year: best American story; tearjerker; best host; best reality competition and best fight against the system, replacing the previous best fight award.

And for the first time, programmes shown on TV and streaming services will also be included in the awards.

Horror comedy Get Out leads the MTV nominations, with six nods in categories including movie of the year and best actor for star Daniel Kaluuya.

Beauty And The Beast and Stranger Things each earned four nominations.

Atlanta, Game Of Thrones and Hidden Figures received three nods, as did Logan, Moonlight and This Is Us.

American comedian Adam Devine will host the MTV Movie and TV Awards in LA on 7 May.