Screen Rant
10 Actors Who Are 1 Award Away From An EGOT
BY LYNN SHARPE
PUBLISHED January 23, 2024
An EGOT is no easy feat, but many actors and other creatives in show business are only missing one of the four types of awards needed to achieve the prestigious award status. Coined by Miami Vice actor Philip Michael Thomas in 1984 (via Vanity Fair), EGOT is an acronym for Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony, the four major performing arts awards in the American entertainment industry. The first person to win all four awards and thus achieve an EGOT was composer Richard Rodgers in 1962. Since then, there has been a total of only 19 EGOT winners in history.
Before his 2024 Emmy win for Outstanding Variety Special made him the newest member of the EGOT club, Elton John was among the much larger group of almost-EGOT winners, many of whom are actors. While plenty of actors are one award away from an EGOT, all ten actors on this list have at least a Tony and an Emmy and are just missing either a Grammy or an Oscar. The five actors on this list without a Grammy have achieved the “Triple Crown of Acting,” meaning they’ve all won a competitive Oscar, Emmy, and Tony Award in the acting categories.
10. Bette Midler
Needs an Oscar
| Bette Midler | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Grammy | Tony | Emmy |
| Year Received | 1974 | 1974 | 1978 |
| Award Category | Best New Artist | Special Award | Outstanding Comedy-Variety or Music Special |
| Won For | Best New Artist | Special Award | Bette Midler: Ol’ Red Hair is Back |
Multihyphenate Bette Midler, who is a screen and stage performer as well as a recording artist, won all three of her awards in only four years, though one of these awards was non-competitive. The same year she won her first Grammy for Best New Artist in 1974, Midler also won her first Tony, a Special Award for her contributions to the Broadway season with her musical Clams on the Half Shell Revue. Midler wouldn’t win a competitive Tony until 2017, when she won Best Actress in a Musical for playing the eponymous role in Hello, Dolly!
In 1978, Midler won her first Emmy for Outstanding Comedy-Variety or Music Special for Bette Midler: Ol’ Red Hair is Back. Now, all Midler needs to get an EGOT is an Oscar, though she hasn’t been nominated in over 30 years. Midler was nominated twice for Best Actress, the first for The Rose in 1980 and the second for For the Boys in 1992.
9. Jeremy Irons
Needs a Grammy
| Jeremy Irons | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Tony | Oscar | Emmy |
| Year Received | 1984 | 1991 | 1997 |
| Award Category | Best Leading Actor in a Play | Best Actor | Outstanding Character Voice-Over Performance |
| Won For | The Real Thing | Reversal of Fortune | The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century |
Jeremy Irons is one of five actors on this list to achieve the Triple Crown of Acting, which he accomplished by 1997. He won his first and only Tony Award in 1984 for Best Leading Actor in a Play for his role as Henry in The Real Thing. Seven years later, he won his first and only Oscar for Best Actor for Reversal of Fortune in 1991.
In 1997, Irons won his first Emmy for Outstanding Character Voice-Over Performance for voicing Siegfried Sassoon in the PBS docuseries The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century about World War I. Irons was nominated for three more Emmys, winning for Elizabeth I in 2006 and Game of Lions in 2014. Irons is only missing a Grammy from his EGOT lineup, for which he’s been nominated once. In 1985, Irons was nominated for Best Spoken Word Album for the recording of The Real Thing, the same play he won his Tony for that awards season.
8. Vanessa Redgrave
Needs a Grammy
| Vanessa Redgrave | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Oscar | Emmy | Tony |
| Year Received | 1978 | 1981 | 2003 |
| Award Category | Best Supporting Actress | Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie | Best Leading Actress in a Play |
| Won For | Julia | Playing for Time | Long Day’s Journey into Night |
Like Irons, Vanessa Redgrave also has the Triple Crown of Acting, though hers took a lot longer to achieve. After three prior nominations for Best Actress, Redgrave finally won her first and only Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for Julia in 1978. A few years later, she won her first Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie in 1991 for the TV movie Playing for Time. She has since been nominated for five more Emmys, winning Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie for If These Walls Could Talk 2 in 2000.
It wasn’t until 2003 that Redgrave finally won her first and only Tony Award, completing the Triple Crown of Acting. She won for Best Leading Actress in a Play for playing Mary in Long Day’s Journey into Night. The only award Redgrave needs to achieve EGOT status now is a Grammy, for which she’s never been nominated.
7. Al Pacino
Needs a Grammy
| Al Pacino | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Tony | Oscar | Emmy |
| Year Received | 1969 | 1993 | 2004 |
| Award Category | Best Featured Actor in a Play | Best Actor | Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie |
| Won For | Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie? | Scent of a Woman | Angels in America |
One year after Redgrave, Al Pacino joined the Triple Crown of Acting club, which took him 35 years. In 1969, Pacino won his first Tony for Best Featured Actor in a Play for Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie? He went on to be nominated for two more Tony Awards, winning for Best Leading Actor in a Play for The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel in 1977.
Then, after seven nominations over the course of 20 years, Pacino finally won his first Oscar in 1993. He ended up winning Best Actor for Scent of a Woman, but he was also nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Glengarry Glen Ross that same year. These dual nominations made him one of the few actors to ever be nominated in two different acting categories at the same Oscars ceremony. Since then, he’s only been nominated once more in 2020 for The Irishman. To this day, Pacino is one of the most Oscar-nominated actors of all time with nine nominations.
Pacino capped off his Triple Crown of Acting with his first Emmy win in 2004. He won for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie for the HBO miniseries adaptation of Angels in America. He has since been nominated for the same Emmy Award two more times, winning for You Don’t Know Jack in 2010. Though he was nominated in 2001 for Best Spoken Word Album alongside the other narrators for The Complete Shakespeare Sonnets audiobook, Pacino is still missing a Grammy for his EGOT.
6. Cynthia Nixon
Needs an Oscar
| Cynthia Nixon | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Emmy | Tony | Grammy |
| Year Received | 2004 | 2006 | 2009 |
| Award Category | Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series | Best Leading Actress in a Play | Best Spoken Word Album |
| Won For | Sex and the City | Rabbit Hole | An Inconvenient Truth |
Cynthia Nixon reached almost-EGOT status in 2009, after winning her three qualifying awards in just five years. After receiving two Emmy nominations in a row for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her best-known role as Miranda Hobbes on Sex and the City, Nixon finally won the award in 2004. Two years later, Nixon won her first Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Play for Rabbit Hole in 2006, a decade after her first nomination.
Three years after her first Tony win, Nixon won her first and only Grammy in 2009. She won the award for Best Spoken Word Album along with the other narrators of the audiobook for Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Now, she only needs an Oscar for a complete EGOT, for which she’s never received a nomination.
5. Geoffrey Rush
Needs a Grammy
| Geoffrey Rush | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Oscar | Emmy | Tony |
| Year Received | 1997 | 2005 | 2009 |
| Award Category | Best Actor | Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie | Best Leading Actor in a Play |
| Won For | Shine | The Life and Death of Peter Sellers | Exit the King |
Geoffrey Rush has also achieved the Triple Crown of Acting, though, unlike the other Triple Crown holders on this list, he only has one of each of the three acting awards under his belt. Rush’s first and only Oscar win was in 1997 for Best Actor for Shine. He went on to be nominated again for Shakespeare in Love in 1999, Quills in 2000, and The King’s Speech in 2011, but lost all three Oscars.
In 2005, he won his first and only Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie for The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. He was nominated for the same award once more in 2017 for playing Albert Einstein in the anthology series Genius but lost. In 2009, Rush won his first and only Tony Award for Best Leading Actor in a Play for Exit the King. Rush would need a Grammy win to reach EGOT status, but, like Redgrave, he has never been nominated.
4. Jessica Lange
Needs a Grammy
| Jessica Lange | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Oscar | Emmy | Tony |
| Year Received | 1983 | 2009 | 2016 |
| Award Category | Best Supporting Actress | Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie | Best Leading Actress in a Play |
| Won For | Tootsie | Grey Gardens | Long Day’s Journey into Night |
Jessica Lange is the most recent actor on this list to reach the milestone of the Triple Crown of Acting, which she achieved in 2016. Ten years before Pacino’s win in 1993, Lange was also nominated in two different acting categories at the 1983 Oscars. She ended up losing the award for Best Actress for Frances but won Best Supporting Actress for Tootsie. Lange has since been nominated for Best Actress at the Oscars four more times, the most recent of which was in 1995 for Blue Sky, which she won.
26 years after her first Oscar win, Lange finally won her first Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for Grey Gardens. She was nominated for seven more Emmys, two of which she won for American Horror Story. In 2016, Lange won her first and only Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Play for playing Mary in Long Day’s Journey into Night, the same role for which Redgrave won her first Tony. Like Redgrave and Rush, Lange has never been nominated for a Grammy, which is the last award she needs for an EGOT.
3. Cynthia Erivo
Needs an Oscar
| Cynthia Erivo | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Tony | Grammy | Emmy |
| Year Received | 2016 | 2017 | 2017 |
| Award Category | Best Leading Actress in a Musical | Best Musical Theater Album | Outstanding Musical Performance in a Daytime Program |
| Won For | The Color Purple | The Color Purple | “The Color Purple” |
Multitalented singer-songwriter and actor Cynthia Erivo managed to win her first Tony, Grammy, and Emmy Awards in under a year, all for the 2015 Broadway revival of The Color Purple. The Tony Awards came first on June 12, 2016, where Erivo won Best Leading Actress in a Musical for her role as Celie. The Grammys took place exactly eight months later, on February 12, 2017, where Erivo was among the winners of Best Musical Theater Album for The Color Purple.
Erivo proceeded to win her first Emmy Award two-and-a-half months later, on April 28, 2017. She and the cast of The Color Purple won the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Musical Performance in a Daytime Program for their performance of the musical’s titular song on The Today Show. If she’d won either of her 2020 Oscar nominations for Harriet, which included Best Actress and Best Original Song for “Stand Up,” Erivo would have become the fastest EGOT winner in history in just four years.
2. Ben Platt
Needs an Oscar
| Ben Platt | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Tony | Grammy | Emmy |
| Year Received | 2017 | 2018 | 2018 |
| Award Category | Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical | Best Musical Theater Album | Outstanding Musical Performance in a Daytime Program |
| Won For | Dear Evan Hansen | Dear Evan Hansen | “You Will Be Found” |
Ben Platt’s ongoing journey towards an EGOT parallels Erivo’s path almost exactly. The musically gifted screen and stage performers are tied for earning all three of their qualifying awards faster than all the other actors on this list. Platt won the exact same Tony, Grammy, and Emmy Awards in the same order as Erivo, though his were during the following awards season for the 2016 Broadway production of Dear Evan Hansen.
Platt won his first Tony on June 11, 2017, for Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical for playing the titular role in Dear Evan Hansen, which he later reprised in the 2021 film adaptation of the stage musical. Next, Platt won his first Grammy just under eight months later, on January 28, 2018, for his Best Musical Theater Album. He and the cast of Parade are nominees for the same award at the 2024 Grammy Awards, airing February 4, 2024, at 8:00pm EST.
Three months after his first Grammy win, Platt won his first Emmy on April 29, 2018. He and the cast of Dear Evan Hansen won Outstanding Musical Performance in a Daytime Program at the Daytime Emmy Awards for their performance of “You Will Be Found” on The Today Show. Platt has yet to be nominated for an Oscar, which he needs to complete the EGOT.
1. Billy Porter
Needs an Oscar
| Billy Porter | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| First Award | Second Award | Third Award | |
| Award Type | Tony | Grammy | Emmy |
| Year Received | 2013 | 2014 | 2019 |
| Award Category | Best Leading Actor in a Musical | Best Musical Theater Album | Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series |
| Won For | Kinky Boots | Kinky Boots | Pose |
The most recent actor on this list to become an almost-EGOT winner is Billy Porter, who won all three awards in six years. Porter won his first Tony in 2013 for Best Leading Actor in a Musical for Kinky Boots. The following year, Porter won his first and only Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album, also for Kinky Boots. In 2019, Porter won his first of three Emmy nominations for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series for playing Pray Tell in Pose. Porter will need an Oscar to become an EGOT winner, though he has not yet been nominated.
