John Legend achieved EGOT status at the Creative Arts Emmy Awards on Sunday, Sept. 9.
The “All of Me” hitmaker’s work as executive producer on “Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert” earned him the Outstanding Variety Special (Live) prize at the second part of the annual ceremony, making him one of a select group to have picked up Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Award, and the youngest artist to achieve the honor.
And his fellow producers on the musical, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Sir Tim Rice, also completed their EGOT with the win.
John, 39, shared a photo of the three of them together backstage at Los Angeles’ Microsoft Theatre on his Instagram page and wrote: “Before tonight, only 12 people had won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony in competitive categories. Sirs Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice and I joined that group when we won an Emmy for our production of their legendary show Jesus Christ Superstar. So happy to be part of this team. So honored they trusted me to play Jesus Christ. So amazed to be in such rarefied air. #EGOT (sic)”
The musical also picked up four other awards, for production design, lighting, technical direction and sound mixing, making it one of the night’s biggest winners.
The late chef Anthony Bourdain, who took his own life in June, was honored with five awards for his “Parts Unknown” show, and the program’s executive producer, Lydia Tenaglia, broke down as she accepted the prize for writing for a non-fiction program.
She admitted taking the award gave her a feeling of “tremendous bittersweetness” given that Bourdain had been nominated in the past but never won.
She added: “He’s off on a journey to parts unknown. We wish we could be there to shoot that journey with him. I think he would have written the hell out of that episode.”
“Saturday Night Live” picked up six awards on Sunday, bringing its Creative Arts total to seven after Tiffany Haddish picked up Guest Actress in a Comedy Series on Saturday, September 8.
