Viola Davis reaches EGOT status with first Grammy win

Davis becomes the third Black woman in history to win an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Award.

Viola Davis won her first career Grammy Award, making her the latest artist to achieve EGOT status.

Davis won the Grammy for Best Audiobook, Narration, and Storytelling Recording for the audiobook version of her 2022 memoir, “Finding Me.” With this win, she joined an elite club of artists who have won Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Awards.

Viola Davis accepts the Audio Book, Narration and Storytelling Recording award for Finding Me during the 65th GRAMMY Awards Premiere Ceremony at Microsoft Theater on February 05, 2023 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

“I wrote this book to honor the 6-year-old Viola,” Davis said during her acceptance speech. “To honor her life, her joy, her trauma, everything. And it has been such a journey. I just EGOT!” She thanks book publisher Harper Collins and “everybody who was a part of my story.”

Davis concluded her speech by thanking her husband Julius and their daughter Genesis, calling them “the best chapter in my book.”

The Grammy win makes Davis the third Black female to be an EGOT, following Whoopi Goldberg and Jennifer Hudson, according to NBC News. Before Davis, Hudson was the latest to get an EGOT when she won her first Tony Award in 2022, when the Broadway musical “A Strange Loop,” for which she was a producer, won Best Musical.

Davis won a 2015 Emmy for her role in ABC’s “How to Get Away With Murder,” a 2017 Oscar for “Fences” and has two Tony wins for 2001’s “King Hedley II” and 2010’s “Fences.” She is also only the fourth Black artist to win a competitive EGOT. John Legend achieved an EGOT in 2018 when he won an Emmy for producing ABC’s “Jesus Christ Superstar: Live in Concert,” in the Outstanding Variety Special (Live) category.

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