NEW YORK, NY.- Common would be the first to admit that he has an EGO — that is, an Emmy Award, a Grammy Award and an Oscar — making him just a Tony Award shy from securing the coveted EGOT, the achievement of winning all four major entertainment awards.
Eighteen people have done so, and “Frozen” songwriter Robert Lopez is the only person to do it twice. The most recent addition was actress Viola Davis, who earned a Grammy in February for the audiobook of her memoir, making her one of six women to have an EGOT.
Now Common has a shot at joining this rather uncommon club. The Tony nominations will be announced Tuesday, and he is eligible in the featured actor in a play category after making his Broadway debut in “Between Riverside and Crazy.”
But where did the EGOT acronym come from, and what does it really take to earn the accolade?
Why did we start talking about EGOTs?
Many people who first heard of an EGOT assume it originated on the hit NBC sitcom “30 Rock,” which began airing in 2006. But it turns out the term dates back to 1984, when only three people had achieved EGOT-hood: composer Richard Rodgers and actresses Helen Hayes and Rita Moreno.
It’s actually Philip Michael Thomas, Don Johnson’s partner on the police drama “Miami Vice,” who deserves the naming credit. The accomplishment was previously known as a “grand slam,” a term used for similar achievements in golf and tennis.
Thomas has told reporters that his dream was to win an Emmy for his work on “Miami Vice,” a Grammy for his record albums, an Oscar for a play he wanted to adapt as a film, and a Tony for some musicals he had written.
Thomas, who later claimed the acronym also stood for his career mantra — “Energy, Growth, Opportunity and Talent” — even wore a medallion with “EGOT” engraved on it. But he was never nominated for any of the awards he dreamed of winning.
How did EGOT enter the popular lexicon?
Despite Thomas’ efforts, it took a couple of decades before “EGOT” became a thing. Then Kay Cannon, a writer and producer on “30 Rock,” decided to incorporate the rare feat into a satirical storyline that began in 2009. “You’d hear this red carpet commentary,” Cannon told The New York Times recently, “that they were one award away from EGOT-ing.”
At the time, even some luminaries didn’t know about the distinction. Comedian Whoopi Goldberg first learned she had achieved EGOT status when she guest-starred on one of the four “30 Rock” episodes in which the character Tracy Jordan, played by Tracy Morgan, bought Thomas’ necklace and started strategizing to achieve his own EGOT. (“A good goal for a talented crazy person,” he says in the show.)
“I watched ‘30 Rock’ and loved the concept,” Lopez said. “One doesn’t really ever think of themselves as a candidate for achieving something so ridiculous, but I realized that maybe I could do it one day.” Lopez got his wish in 2014, winning an Oscar for the song “Let It Go” from the Disney animated hit “Frozen.”
Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber was more old school. “I wasn’t thinking, ‘If I get this Emmy, I’d be an EGOT,’ ” Lloyd Webber said about achieving the feat in 2018 for “Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert.” Lyricist Tim Rice and singer John Legend, who played the title role, reached EGOT status at the same time.
“It hadn’t really crossed my mind,” Lloyd Webber said. “I’m much more conscious of it now.”
So, what is the best strategy for winning an EGOT?
The not-so-quiet secret is that when you’re close to an EGOT, it is possible to game the system.
Lloyd Webber said he was recently asked by a fellow artist — someone famous, he won’t say who — how to add a Tony to an awards collection that already included a Grammy and an Emmy. “I said, ‘Well, one way you could do that is become a producer, put some money into a few shows,’ ” he said. “Every show seems to have 20 producers these days.”
That strategy worked for singer and actress Jennifer Hudson, who achieved an EGOT in 2022 with her Tony win as a producer of “A Strange Loop.”
Lloyd Webber thinks getting an Oscar is the most difficult. A Grammy is the easiest, he said, simply because there are more available categories: “You could be the best banjo player in Latin America.”
And if Davis’ clinching Grammy win — in the best audio book, narration and storytelling category — revealed anything, it’s that nonmusical methods can be just as effective. “Do a comedy album or narrate your own audio book,” Cannon said. “Write a book, narrate that and then adapt it to the stage.”
After considering her own track record (“I’m 0-for-4 right now”), Cannon said she thought her best bet could be a Broadway adaptation of “Pitch Perfect,” the 2012 musical comedy film that she co-wrote.
Does it help to have an EGOT as your goal?
Probably not. Renowned composer Alan Menken had already won 11 Grammys, eight Oscars and one Tony when his representatives realized he just needed an Emmy to complete the EGOT. “To be honest, it wasn’t something that was really on my wish list until it was brought up, and brought up, and brought up,” he said. “But you can’t will something like that into existence.”
So about six years ago, Menken wrote a song about wanting to achieve an EGOT, soliciting assistance from comedy writers like Judd Apatow. The idea was that it would start off sounding sincere, and then would get more and more desperate with each section. Ultimately, he discarded the song (“It wasn’t any good, I can promise you”) and instead secured an Emmy for the animated series “Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventure.”
What is the value of an EGOT?
An EGOT is a flattering distinction that ultimately means nothing, said Menken, who described it as a “random assortment of honors.”
“Just do what you do, as well as you can, and don’t think about it,” he added. “If you get awards, great.”
There is no organizing body that awards EGOTs, and no ceremony at which a trophy is handed out. But there are hazy areas of eligibility, such as lifetime achievement awards. There are also EGOT enhancements, like the PEGOT, for either a Peabody Award or a Pulitzer Prize. Some say the G should instead represent a Golden Globe, or that the EGOT should become an EGGOT.
Menken is proud of the fact that he also has a REGOT — the four traditional awards, plus a Razzie, also known as a Golden Raspberry Award. The ignoble prize was for worst original song from the film “Newsies,” the same project for which he won a Tony. “The Razzie puts everything in perspective, frankly,” he said.
At least with the Razzies, there is a ceremony and a physical award. Cannon thinks there should be a similar ceremony for EGOTs, if only a mock version. After all, even “Saturday Night Live” commemorates the occasion when someone hosts the show for a fifth time. “You become a member of the Five-Timers Club, they give you a jacket.”
Who’s not throwing away their shot?
Over the years, artists have become more comfortable expressing their EGOT dreams. In a segment for the 2015 BET Hip Hop Awards, composer and actor Lin-Manuel Miranda rattled off his scorecard: “Got a Grammy, got a Tony, got an Emmy,” he rapped, adding, “Somebody show me the way to the Oscars.”
Miranda’s dream could come true next awards season: He has written new songs for the live-action “The Little Mermaid” movie, which will be released in late May.
Menken, Miranda’s collaborator on the three new “Little Mermaid” songs, mused about whether he should take his name off them to give Miranda a better shot. “I have eight Oscars,” he said. “They’re probably going to go, ‘Alan, man, no.’ So I feel guilty.”
Lopez agreed that Manuel deserves it, but he’s also rooting for someone else: Kristen Anderson-Lopez, his collaborator and wife. She just needs a Tony to secure the EGOT. An added benefit, he said, is that it would bring “more peace to my household.”
So who exactly is in the EGOT club?
These are the 18 people who have won EGOTs, along with the year and award that secured the achievement:
Mel Brooks (2001, Tony)Viola Davis (2023, Grammy)John Gielgud (1991, Emmy)Whoopi Goldberg (2002, Tony)Marvin Hamlisch (1995, Emmy)Helen Hayes (1977, Grammy)Audrey Hepburn (1994, Grammy)Jennifer Hudson (2022, Tony)John Legend (2018, Emmy)Andrew Lloyd Webber (2018, Emmy)Robert Lopez (2014, Oscar)Alan Menken (2020, Emmy)Rita Moreno (1977, Emmy)Mike Nichols (2001, Emmy)Tim Rice (2018, Emmy)Richard Rodgers (1962, Emmy)Scott Rudin (2012, Grammy)Jonathan Tunick (1997, Tony)
This article originally appeared in
The New York Times.
