“Trust me to have an EGO”: Adele one award away from EGOT status
The singer won her first Emmy last night (September 4)
By Joe Goggins
Adele has moved to within one award of the entertainment industry grand slam after scooping her first Emmy.
Only 17 people have achieved EGOT status, meaning that they have won a competitive Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony for excellence in television, recording, film and stage work, respectively. The term was coined in 1984 by ‘Miami Vice’ star Philip Michael Thomas, who expressed an aim to win all four within five years of his breakout on the hit cop show.
Decades later, he has yet to claim any of the four, but last night (September 4), Adele won the Emmy for Outstanding Variety Special for One Night Only, which saw her preview cuts from her then-forthcoming fourth album, 30, in front of a star-studded audience outside Los Angeles’ Griffith Observatory, with the live footage intercut with excerpts from a candid interview with Oprah Winfrey.
The ‘Easy on Me’ hit maker was not present at the Creative Emmy Awards, which precedes the televised Primetime Emmy ceremony that follows next Sunday (September 11), but wrote in an Instagram post in which she posed with the trophy: “Bloody hell I’m pleased as punch! Thank you @mrbenwinston for dropping this round to me this afternoon!! Trust me to officially have an EGO 🤣 Thank you so much @televisionacad , I’m so so honoured to receive this. Big up to everyone involved. @griffithobservatory thank you for letting me sing up on your mountain and big love to all the other nominees.”
Also nominated in the same category were comedian Dave Chappelle, for his controversial Netflix special The Closer, Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett, for the latter’s career-closing concert One Last Time, late comic Norm Macdonald’s final stand-up recording, Nothing Special, and the 20th anniversary celebration of the Harry Potter film franchise, Return to Hogwarts.
Beating those competitors leaves Adele just a Tony Award away from joining the likes of Audrey Hepburn, John Legend and Andrew Lloyd Webber in the exclusive club. Also needing a Tony after last night’s ceremony are Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, who’s role as producers on Peter Jackson’s Disney+ documentary ‘The Beatles: Get Back’ saw them honoured in the Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Series category.