Actor Viola Davis on Sunday joined the rare firmament of showbiz luminaries to have won competitive Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony awards—the so-called EGOT—after taking home the gramophone for best audiobook, narration, and storytelling.
The 57-year-old Davis earned the Grammy for voicing the audio version of her best-selling 2022 memoir Finding Me.
“I wrote this book to honor the six-year-old Viola,” she said at the pre-telecast ceremony in Los Angeles. “To honor her life, her joy, her trauma, everything. And, it has just been such a journey—I just EGOT!”
Davis bested a rather formidable field: comedian Mel Brooks, who already has an EGOT; composer and actor Lin-Manuel Miranda, who is an Oscar away; and actor Jamie Foxx and musician Questlove, who are both Oscar and Grammy winners.
Davis won an Oscar in 2017 for best supporting actress for Fences opposite Denzel Washington, and a Tony—her second—for the same role in August Wilson’s play in 2010.
She won an Emmy for best actress in a drama for How to Get Away with Murder in 2015.
Davis is the 18th person to achieve the feat. The most recent before her was Jennifer Hudson in 2021. Other winners include actors Whoopi Goldberg and Rita Moreno, Broadway composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, and crooner John Legend.
