Big Night For Brits At International Emmys

British television productions have won five awards at the International Emmys, including acting accolades for Christopher Eccleston and Julie Walters.

The 39th awards in New York began with a surprise appearance from Lady Gaga.

She presented the Founders Award to British producer Nigel Lythgoe, the man behind US reality shows American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance.

Gaga thanked him for "all of the early opportunities he gave me to perform on TV" and cited the £89m-plus he has raised for charity.

She added: "He has always helped to nurture and foster my ideas, no matter how crazy or demographic-unfriendly they may have been."

Former Doctor Who Eccleston won best actor for his role in BBC crime drama Accused - which also won best drama.

The series tells the stories of individuals accused of crimes as they sit in the holding cells beneath the courtroom awaiting the verdict in their trials.

Eccleston played a financially stressed, lapsed Catholic plumber who finds £20,000 in the back of a taxi, doubles his money on the roulette wheel, but ends up in court after the windfall turns out to be forged notes.

Walters won best actress for the TV film Mo in which she portrayed the late Mo Mowlam.

The politican concealed her brain tumour from the then Prime Minister Tony Blair while working on the 1998 Northern Ireland peace deal.

Walters has previously won a Bafta for the same role.

The other British winners were for shows which centre around teenagers in unusual circumstances.

Gareth Malone Goes To Glyndebourne won in the arts category for its account of the staging of a new opera featuring untrained teenagers at the renowned British opera house.

The Emmy for non-scripted entertainment went to The World's Strictest Parents, which takes unruly British teenagers and sends them abroad to spend 10 days living with a strict host family.Forty nominees from 20 countries were competing in 10 categories at the awards ceremony, which was hosted for the second year by former Beverly Hills 90210 star Jason Priestley.The award in the TV Movie/Mini-Series category went to Sweden's Millennium based on the late Stieg Larsson's best-selling trilogy.In the telenovela category, Portugal won for the second straight year - this time for Lacos de Sangue" ("Blood Ties"), about a supposed drowning victim who unexpectedly reappears to take revenge on her older sister.A real-life family drama, Canada's Life With Murder, about parents struggling to come to terms with their son after he is accused of killing his younger sister, was chosen as best documentary.The Belgian hidden camera show, Benidorm Bastards, in which seven senior citizens set out to trick as many young people as they can, received the award for best comedy.The honorary International Emmy Directorate Award went to Indian media mogul Subhash Chandra, who broke a government monopoly by launching India's first privately owned television channel nearly 20 years ago.

His Zee TV network now reaches more than 600 million viewers worldwide.