The change in the way the TV academy came up with its list of nominees to help thespians and series from smaller niche networks worked out great yesterday for CBS's "Two and a Half Men," which snagged nominations for best sitcom, lead actor Charlie Sheen and supporting actor Jon Cryer. Oh, and Kevin James copped his first ever nom for CBS's "King of Queens."

But for the so-called niche networks it was supposed to help — not so much.

Meanwhile, academy voters "totally ... (expletive deleted) slapped the 'Desperate Housewives' and really roughed up 'The Sopranos,' " to quote Tom O'Neill, who literally wrote the book on the Emmys. Loosely translated that means James Gandolfini and Edie Falco surprisingly did not receive nominations for their work on the HBO mob drama, and none of ABC's desperate housewives of Wisteria Lane got nominated this year — even though three of the four had received noms last year, and Felicity Huffman won the trophy for best comedy actress.

Meanwhile, "Desperate Housewives" itself, which was nominated last year for the best comedy trophy, also got snubbed yesterday in the best comedy race; ditto last year's best drama series winner, ABC's "Lost."

For the first time, blue-ribbon panels this year chose nominees from among the 10 shows or actors who had received the most votes by academy members. The change was intended to help shows and actors seen on smaller, niche networks get into the race.

But all 10 nominees for best drama and comedy series air on a Big Four broadcaster or HBO — business as usual.

In drama that includes ABC's "Grey's Anatomy," Fox's "House" and "24," HBO's "The Sopranos," and NBC's "The West Wing." Comedy contenders this year are Fox's "Arrested Development," HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm," NBC's "The Office" and "Scrubs" and CBS's aforementioned "Two and a Half Men."

Meanwhile, only three actors in the lead-acting derbies hailed from niche networks: FX's "Rescue Me" star Denis Leary, TNT's "The Closer" lead Kyra Sedgwick and USA's "Monk" star Tony Shalhoub. But both Leary and Shalhoub have been nominated before and Shalhoub has turned two of his previous three best comedy actor nominations into wins.

Besides Leary, the race for best drama series actor includes "Six Feet Under's" Peter Krause, "24's" Kiefer Sutherland, "The West Wing's" Martin Sheen and, this year's only surprise, Christopher Meloni of "Law & Order: Special Victim's Unit."

Joining Sedgwick in the race for best drama series actresses: "Commander in Chief's" Geena Davis, "Law & Order: SVU's" Mariska Hargitay, "Six Feet Under's" Frances Conroy and "The West Wing's" Allison Janney.

Charlie Sheen, James and Shalhoub will duke it out for best comedy actor with "Curb Your Enthusiasm"'s Larry David, and "The Office's" Steve Carell, while the race for best sitcom actress this year includes "Malcolm in the Middle's" Jane Kaczmarek, "Will & Grace's" Debra Messing, "Out of Practice's" Stockard Channing, "The New Adventures of Old Christine" star Julie Louis-Dreyfus, and "The Comeback" kid Lisa Kudrow.

The jaw dropping lack-of-change sent shockwaves through the Leonard H. Goldenson Theatre at the TV academy's North Hollywood headquarters, where Louis-Dreyfus and Brad Garrett announced the glam category nominees yesterday morning.

You could see the outrage in the heaving bosoms of the celebrity suck-up show hostesses — there to do live feeds for their networks — as they grilled Louis-Dreyfus about the fabulous tight white eyelet cleavage-revealing dress into which she had poured herself for the morning's festivities as well as what she intended to wear on Emmy night.

Male on-air talent were outraged, too, you just couldn't see their chests heaving under their dark suits. But their eyes flashed, which is almost as good: "It's television's biggest night! The Emmy nominations are in and we'll tell you who's got some serious celebrating to do!"

OK, maybe that guy isn't such a good example. But how about this:

"It didn't accomplish its goal to boost those other networks," said Tom O'Neill, the Yoda of prime-time Emmy nominations who was here to do commentary for CNN Headline News.

Noticeably missing from yesterday morning's nominations was Lauren Graham, star of WB's "Gilmore Girls" and darling of some TV critics. Graham, who has never been nominated during her six years on the series, had become something of a poster child for the need to overhaul the way in which the nominations list was formed.

"That Lauren Graham is not here is going to cause industry outrage," O'Neill said. "Many think the system was tinkered with so she could finally get her due. ... The system that was designed to help mostly the artsy stuff ended up boosting 'Two and a Half Men.' "

Talking to CNN Headline News, he added that "TV critics of America say she's given the best performance on the tube. ... There are some surprises, but the surprises we'd hoped to see were not here," he said.