Sheryl Lee Ralph on receiving Emmy nomination while hosting livestream: 'Most incredible feeling'

Sheryl Lee Ralph is enjoying her moment.

Ralph scored her third consecutive Emmy Award nomination for best supporting actress in a comedy series for “Abbott Elementary” on July 17. She was informed of her Emmy nod by Television Academy Chair Cris Abrego, who came out during the reading of the Emmy nominations livestream that she co-hosted alongside Tony Hale.

After hearing the news from Abrego, proceeded to dance for joy and say, “Honey, that never gets old!”

During a July 18 episode of TODAY with Hoda & Jenna, hosted by Jenna Bush Hager and guest co-host Willie Geist, Ralph said it was an amazing experience to learn about her nomination while she was on hand reading the other nominations.

“It’s the most incredible feeling because people don’t have to love you, they don’t have to like you and they certainly don’t have to vote for you,” she said.

“And for my peers to vote for me three years consecutively, to put me in the list of the best in my category in the industry is just such a gift," she continued. "And the company that I’m keeping. I said, ‘Carol (Burnett),’ ‘Meryl (Streep)’ and ‘Sheryl.’”

“I was just like, ‘Wow, thank you, God!’” she added.

Ralph does have some hefty competition this year, going up against legends Burnett, for “Palm Royale,” and Streep, for “Only Murders in the Building.” They’re joined by Liza Colón-Zayas (“The Bear”), Hannah Einbinder (“Hacks”) and Ralph’s “Abbott Elementary” co-star Janelle James, who, like Ralph, has now been nominated for three Emmy Awards for her work on the show.

Ralph, won her Emmy Award in 2022, has been an actor for some four decades, with her first onscreen major credit taking place in the 1977 movie “A Piece of the Action.” While some say she’s an overnight success, she’s quick to point out it’s been a long road and that she’s loving where she is right now in her life.

“It took me 40 years to get here, 40 good years. It’s like magic,” she said.

“People say, ‘Why are you so happy?’ I’m saying because you don’t understand what my journey has been like, what things I’ve had to overcome to get to this moment of complete and absolute acceptance of who I am as a human being, as an artist," she explained.

“And it’s like a gift from God. I know my parents are up in heaven like, ‘We got you, girl. We got you,’” she added.

Ralph, who stars with Bette Midler, Susan Sarandon and Megan Mullally in the upcoming movie “The Fabulous Four,” feels even further blessed now that Hurricane Beryl has passed. The hurricane, which turned into a Category 4 storm, also threatened to interrupt her son’s wedding that happened in Jamaica.

“Let me tell you something,” she said. “You have no idea what it is like to see sheets of rain come down that you cannot see through, to hear the roar of the Earth, the train and everything.”

“The wedding was scheduled to be over at 1 a.m. At 1:07, the sky opened up and Mother Nature said, ‘Honey, I gave you one good day,’” she added. “Yeah, it was crazy.”

This article was originally published on TODAY.com