For the third year in a row, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation will be fighting for Outstanding Drama honors on Emmy night.

At the Emmy awards announcements in Los Angeles this morning at 5:39am Pacific Time, CSI received its Best Drama nomination alongside The Sopranos, The West Wing, 24, and Joan of Arcadia. Edie Falco of The Sopranos and Tony Shalhoub of Monk, both Emmy nominees this year themselves, presented the list of nominations with Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Chairman and CEO Dick Askin for the 56th Annual awards.

Four out of the five nominees, including CSI, competed last year for the trophy; Joan of Arcadia is the only new entry. The CBS freshman drama replaces Six Feet Under, which received a nod last year. The West Wing is the reigning champion, with four consecutive wins under its belt.

While their was some speculation that William Petersen or Marg Helgenberger might pick up acting nominations, neither received one. Helgenberger has been nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series twice before, in 2001 and 2003, but both times she lost out to Falco, who was nominated again this year.

While CSI scored four nods this year, its spinoff CSI: Miami was left empty-handed, despite winning the Emmy for Outstanding Cinematography last year. CSI was nominated for six awards last year, and won one for Outstanding Sound Editing. This year's four nominations bring CSI's Emmy nomination total to 20 in the four years the show has been on the air.

CSI's four nominations are:

• Outstanding Drama Series: The production team behind the drama are executive producers Jerry Bruckheimer, Carol Mendelsohn, Jonathan Littman,Anthony E. Zuiker, Ann Donahue, Danny Cannon, William Petersen and Cindy Chvatal, co-executive producers Naren Shankar and Andrew Lipsitz, Supervising Producers Josh Berman and Louis Milito, Producers Ken Fink, Richard Lewis, Bruce Golin, and Elizabeth Devine.

• Outstanding Cinematography for a Single-Camera Series: Last year CSI: Miami took this trophy for "Simple Man", but this year Frank Byers is nominated for his work on "XX". His competition included episodes from Alias, Carnivale, The Sopranos, and The West Wing.

• Outstanding Makeup for a Series (Non Prosthetic): The makeup team at CSI scored their third Emmy nomination for the 4th season two-part opener, "Assume Nothing" and "All For Our Country". Nick Pagliaro (makeup artist), Melanie Levitt (makeup artist), John Goodwin (FX makeup artist) and Jackie Tichenor (makeup artist) won in 2002 for "Slaves of Las Vegas". This year they'll compete with episodes of Carnivale, Deadwood, Gilmore Girls, and Nip/Tuck.

• Outstanding Single-Camera Sound Mixing For a Series: Yuri Reese (Re-Recording Mixer), Bill Smith (Re-Recording Mixer), and Mick Fowler (Production Sound Mixer) are nominated for their work in "Grissom Versus the Volcano". The other nominated shows in the category are Alias, The Sopranos, 24 and The West Wing.

This year the HBO miniseries Angels in America led the nominations with 21 nods, followed closely by The Sopranos with 20. The West Wing was in third place with 12 nominations. Everybody Loves Raymond was the most lauded CBS show with nine nods.

CBS itself picked up 44 nominations in total, making in the network with the third-most nominations. Last year, CBS received 59 nominations. HBO took first place this year with an astounding 124 nominations, up from last year's 109. NBC took 65 nominations this year; last year, it had 77. ABC got 33 nominations, PBS has 27, and A&E picked up 24. UPN scored 4 (all for Star Trek: Enterprise) and the WB got 2.

CSI scored the highest number of nominations for any network crime drama, followed by Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (the only Law & Order series to be nominated this year) with three, and Without a Trace with two. Without a Trace's star Anthony LaPaglia is up for Outstanding Actor in a Drama, while Martin Landau earned a nod for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for guest stint on the show.

Gary Shandling will preside over the 56th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards, which take place on Sunday, September 19th at the Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium. The broadcast will air on ABC. The creative awards ceremony will be given out on Sunday, September 12th.

To see a complete list of the nominees, please visit the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences website!

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