A handful of people got one step closer to EGOT-ing on Wednesday, thanks to the Television Academy. After the 2024 Emmy nominations, songwriting duo Benj Pasek and Justin Paul are the closest to gaining membership to the coveted EGOT club, with a real shot of joining the ranks of the 19 artists who have won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony in competition.
Although both are just 39 years old, Pasek and Paul have been raking in awards for their songwriting for some time now. After meeting as musical theater students at the University of Michigan, the two won Tony Awards in 2017 for Dear Evan Hansen, starring Ben Platt. That same year, they also picked up a best-original-song Oscar for cowriting “City of Stars” from La La Land (a film produced by Ben’s father, Marc Platt). The following year, Dear Evan Hansen earned the duo a Grammy for best musical theater album, making them one Emmy-winning envelope away from achieving EGOT status.
Pasek and Paul’s first Emmy nomination for outstanding original music and lyrics came in 2019. They lost the award that year to SNL‘s Chris Redd and Kenan Thompson, authors of the viral liberal-yearning anthem “Come Back Barack.” But this year, Pasek and Paul are back in Emmy contention—alongside their cowriters, Tony and Grammy winners Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman—for “Which of the Pickwick Triplets Did It,” a toe-tapper they penned for Only Murders in the Building season three.
The song, performed in the series by Steve Martin‘s Charles-Haden Savage, is a delightful and tongue-twisting patter song. It could very well allow Pasek and Paul to join Frozen, Coco, Avenue Q, and Book of Mormon composer Robert Lopez as the youngest people to ever EGOT. (Lopez also EGOTed at 39, and has since become the first person to double EGOT, a.k.a win each award twice.)
But to earn the Emmy, the’ll have to beat some stiff competition. Pasek and Paul are up against other nominees like True Detective star John Hawkes and Maya Rudolph, whose nod for her musical Saturday Night Live opening is one of the four nominations she earned just this year. They’re also competing with Grammy and Oscar-winning composing legend Hans Zimmer. Pasek and Paul have faced off against Zimmer in awards races four times before, falling short on three of those occasions—so some might say they are the underdog in this fight. Even if they do prevail against Zimmer, there’s one more nominee in the category they’d have to beat out to clinch EGOT status: Sara Bareilles and her musical stylings on the criminally underrated Netflix comedy Girls5Eva.
By the way: if Bareilles takes home the Emmy, she’ll be halfway to EGOT status herself, as she already has two Grammys under her belt. Barielles also has been nominated for three Tonys—two for writing and one for her indelible performance as The Baker’s Wife in the recent Into The Woods revival—so it feels like it won’t be long before she adds a T to her resume.
And she’s not the only artist who has the potential to get halfway to EGOT at this year’s Emmys. Recent Oscar winner Jaimie Lee Curtis is heavily favored to take home the guest actress in a comedy series Emmy for her histrionic work as Carmy’s mother on season two of The Bear. And Matthew Broderick has the potential to go from two-time Tony winner to Tony and Emmy winner if he takes home the guest actor in a comedy series trophy for his appearance as himself on Only Murders in the Building.
A handful of iconic actors in the Emmy conversation this year, like outstanding supporting actress in a comedy nominees Meryl Streep (Only Murders in the Building) and Carol Burnett (Palm Royale), are only one award away from EGOT. But if either of them win, it won’t move the EGOT needle—they both already have Emmys. The same can’t be said for Jodie Foster, nominated for lead actress in a miniseries or anthology for True Detective: Night Country; if she takes home an Emmy, she’ll be halfway to EGOT as well. Five-time Emmy nominee Morgan Freeman would also reach the halfway point if he takes home outstanding narrator for the Netflix docuseries Life on our Planet. Our two most recent supporting actor and actress Oscar winners, Robert Downey Jr. and DaVine Joy Randolph, are chasing that vital second statue as well. They’re both nominated for Emmys—for outstanding supporting actor in a drama series for The Sympathizer and outstanding guest actress in a comedy series for Only Murders in the Building, respectively.
Of all the actors looking to get halfway to EGOT, Oscar nominee and Tony-winner Jonathan Pryce may be in the best position to inch closer to EGOT status. He’s nominated twice this year: for outstanding supporting actor in a drama series for his final season portraying Prince Phillip on Netflix’s The Crown, and for outstanding guest actor in a drama series for his turn on Slow Horses.
Then again, actor and writer Tracy Letts—recipient of a surprise nomination for outstanding guest actor for playing basketball coach Jack McKinney on HBO’s canceled series Winning Time—may really be the one to watch. (Fun fact: his wife, Carrie Coon, also scored an Emmy nod Wednesday: a leading actress nomination for The Gilded Age). If he won, he’d also be halfway to EGOT’ing; he’s already got two Tonys—one for writing August Osage County, and one for acting in the revival of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Letts has a Pulitzer too, for writing August Osage County—so PEGOT watch begins now.