Elton John Joins Elite List of EGOT Winners

Hannah Southwick

January 16, 2024 at 12:08 PM·12 min read

Elton John is now an EGOT winner.

Viola Davis made history at the 2023 Grammys when she achieved EGOT status, winning the award for Best Audiobook, Narration and Storytelling.

Elton John made history at the 2023 Emmy Awards when he achieved EGOT status with an Emmy win for Disney+’s Elton John Live: Farewell From Dodger Stadium as Outstanding Variety Special (Live).

As awards-show lovers know, that acronym stands for "Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony," and represents those very few Hollywood heavyweights who've managed to win hardware for their work in TV, audio recordings, movies and the Broadway stage.

It takes a special skill set to score all four, and it's an honor very few people—17, to be exact—have achieved so far. Who else besides Davis has pulled it off—and how? Below, see all the stars who’ve become EGOTs over the years.

EGOT Winners

Richard Rodgers

First in the not-so-long line of EGOTs? Prolific American composer Richard Rodgers, who achieved the prestigious honor years before there was a snappy acronym for it. What’s more, Rodgers is to this day still one of only two EGOT winners to have also won a Pulitzer Prize (Marvin Hamlisch is the other “PEGOT”). Among the composing great’s award-winning projects? The triple Tony Award-winning South Pacific, Grammy-winning The Sound of Music, and Oscar-winning State Fair, which won the Academy Award for Best Original Song.

Helen Hayes

Nicknamed the “First Lady of the American Theatre,” Helen Hayes was also the first woman to ever become an EGOT in 1977. More than four decades after she earned a Tony for her role in Happy Birthday in 1947, she finally finished collecting her EGOT set with a Grammy in 1977 for Best Spoken Word Recording for Great American Documents. Nowadays, her name even graces its own awards: The Helen Hayes Awards, which honor Washington D.C.’s theater community.

Rita Moreno

After Rita Moreno sang and danced her way to an Oscar for 1961's West Side Story, it would be a decade before she checked another trophy off her list: the Grammy for Best Recording for Children for her role in The Electric Company. She also earned a Tony for her role in The Ritz, then officially became an EGOT winner in 1977 thanks to her Emmy-winning performance in The Muppet Show. (She won another Emmy a year later for guest-starring on The Rockford Files.) Even though she took time off from acting after West Side Story—citing that she didn’t want to be continually cast in stereotypical roles—Moreno still earned all four awards the second-fastest out of all her fellow EGOT recipients. If she’s nominated for another Oscar for the much-hyped West Side Story remake in 2022, Moreno stands to smash several more records, including becoming the oldest person ever up for an Academy Award in a competitive category.

John Gielgud

John Gielgud was 87 when he won an Emmy in 1992 for his performance in Summer’s Lease, making him the oldest person to rack up the coveted combination of awards. He previously won two Tonys (one in the 1940s, the other in the 1950s), a Grammy (for Best Spoken Word, Documentary or Drama Recording) and the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his famous performance as the butler, Hobson, in Arthur.

Audrey Hepburn

Would any list of legends be complete without Audrey Hepburn? While it took the Hollywood icon 41 years to score all four awards, she finally did so in 1994 when she was awarded the Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album for Children for Audrey Hepburn’s Enchanted Tales. Having passed on from cancer the year before, Hepburn was the first person to earn EGOT status posthumously. Her other awards include a Tony for her performance in Odine, an Emmy for her informational series Gardens of the World with Audrey Hepburn and, of course, an Academy Award for her iconic role in Roman Holiday.

Marvin Hamlisch

The composer completed his EGOT in 1995 after receiving two Emmys for Barbra Streisand's Barbra: The Concert. Like Rodgers, Marvin Hamlisch also added a Pulitzer Prize to his vast collection of awards after winning for A Chorus Line, for which he also won a Tony in 1976. While he was 51 when he earned his EGOT, Hamlisch got his start at a much younger age; by 7 years old, the child prodigy had reportedly already auditioned for what was then called Juilliard's Preparatory Division.

Jonathan Tunick

Composer Jonathan Tunick became the first orchestrator to ever win a Tony Award in 1997, when he took home the coveted prize for Best Orchestrations for Titanic. While the Tony cemented his EGOT status, he also won one each of the other acronym-worthy accolades, including an Oscar in 1977 for Best Adaptation Score for A Little Night Music.

Mel Brooks

A comedy legend who got his start writing for variety television shows, Mel Brooks’ path to the prestigious acronym began when he won an Emmy back in 1967. It was the first of a staggering number of statuettes, as The Producers movie he wrote and directed won the Oscar for Best Screenplay in 1969; after he turned the film into a Broadway musical in 2001, it won a record-setting 12 Tonys.

Mike Nichols

Triple-threat Mike Nichols won awards for his directing, acting and comedy over the course of his illustrious showbiz career. His wins include a whopping eight Tony Awards—which comes as no surprise, considering he directed almost 30 plays. He also helmed 20 films, but The Graduate was his only Oscar-winning effort, as he collected the Best Director award for the comedy in 1968.

Whoopi Goldberg

Whoopi Goldberg may be known for her comedy, but her list of accolades can only be described as a serious stack of awards. After getting the Grammy for Best Comedy Recording in 1986, the star soon snagged an Academy Award for her performance in Ghost. She later cemented her EGOT status in 2002 when she won an Emmy (for Beyond Tara: The Extraordinary Life of Hattie McDaniel) followed by a Tony Award for her role as a producer of Thoroughly Modern Millie. Long before she was winning awards, Goldberg got her big break when now-fellow EGOT Mike Nichols discovered her; she then followed in his footsteps by achieving EGOT status only a year after he did.

Scott Rudin

Prolific producer Scott Rudin (who's recently taken a big step back from showbiz after being accused of abusive behavior) became an EGOT winner in 2012 after winning the Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album for The Book of Mormon, which he produced; he also won one of his many Tony Awards for the same show. Other highlights of the super-producer’s career include an Oscar for No Country for Old Men and an Emmy for the children's program He Makes Me Feel Like Dancin’.

Robert Lopez

Standout songwriter Robert Lopez attained EGOT status at a younger age (39) and in less time than anyone else, taking only 10 years to go from his first major award win—a Tony for Avenue Q—to his EGOT-completing honor, the Academy Award for Best Original Song for the famous Frozen track “Let it Go” in 2014. He certainly didn’t let go of his winning streak, however, as he later became the only person to achieve a double EGOT, with more than one win in each award category. The celebrated composer’s other award-winning music projects range from the animated series Wonder Pets! to Broadway hits like The Book of Mormon, which he co-created.

John Legend

From “All of Me” to all of the biggest awards in Hollywood, John Legend lives up to his name. While it likely comes as no surprise that the Voice coach has a total of 10 Grammy Awards, he’s also racked up accolades for his producing work, including a Best Revival of a Play Tony for co-producing Jitney. And while he put the “O” in EGOT in 2015 with an Oscar for his song “Glory” from Selma, he didn’t officially join the rare ranks of EGOTs until 2018 when he took home an Emmy for his role as executive producer of Jesus Christ Superstar Live. Legend is also the first EGOT to earn a different kind of award: PEOPLE's “Sexiest Man Alive.”

Alan Menken

Composer Alan Menken has been honored with 11 Grammys (three of them for his work on the Beauty and the Beast soundtrack) as well as eight Oscars and a Tony. After completing the four categories in 2020, Menken told Variety that joining the exclusive group wasn’t something he “[took on] as a life goal,” adding, “I have to admit that since it didn’t happen after a few times, I thought it wasn’t important. When it finally happened and I got the call saying I had finally won, I was surprised at how excited I was.”

Andrew Lloyd Webber

Over the years, legendary composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has racked up four Grammy Awards, including Best Cast Show Album wins for Evita and Cats (1983), and no less than nine Tonys, including the award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatre, which he received in 2018. But it was his Emmy win for Jesus Christ Superstar Live (alongside Legend) in 2018 that made him an EGOT. According to The Hollywood Reporter, he joked backstage at the time, “I have to say, I was sitting through this afternoon thinking, ‘What could I possibly win [next year] if we don’t win. Like, outstanding hairdresser?'”

Tim Rice

Like Legend and Webber, Tim Rice joined the elite EGOT club following his work on Jesus Christ Superstar Live. The lyricist and Webber are frequent collaborators, and Rice’s award-winning projects also include the Oscar and Tony-winning Evita. Among his other memorable honors? Three Academy Awards in the Best Original Song category, including wins for well-known Disney songs like “A Whole New World” from Aladdin and “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” from The Lion King.

Jennifer Hudson

Jennifer Hudson sealed her status as an EGOT on June 12, 2022, when the musical A Strange Loop, won Best Musical.

Hudson's previous acting honors include an Academy Award in 2007 for her role in Dreamgirls and a Daytime Emmy for producing the animated short Baba Yaga. She has two Grammys, winning in 2009 for Best R&B Album and in 2017 for Best Musical Theater Album as part of the revival cast of The Color Purple.

Viola Davis

Viola Davis joined the coveted ranks of EGOT winners on Feb. 5, 2023, when she won the Grammy for Best Audiobook, Narration and Storytelling, for her memoir Finding Me. She previously won two Tonys (for Fences and King Hedley II), an Emmy for How to Get Away With Murder and an Oscar for the film adaptation of Fences.

Elton John

Elton John joined the exclusive ranks of EGOT winners on Jan. 15, 2024, when he won an Emmy for Disney+’s Elton John Live: Farewell From Dodger Stadium as Outstanding Variety Special (Live). Two Oscars (Rocketman and The Lion King), a Tony for Aida and five Grammys round out his EGOT-winning accolades.

Next, Find Out EGOT Winner John Legend's Net Worth

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