Multiple Oscars, Emmys, a Tony Award for producing a “A Strange Loop,” and this new Grammy have put the “E.T.” director in a rarefied class.

Steven Spielberg achieves EGOT with first Grammy win for John Williams documentary

Multiple Oscars, Emmys, a Tony Award for producing a "A Strange Loop," and this new Grammy have put the "E.T." director in a rarefied class.

By Ryan Coleman

Ryan Coleman

Ryan Coleman is a news writer for with previous work in MUBI Notebook, Slant, and the LA Review of Books.

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February 1, 2026 7:24 p.m. ET

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Steven Spielberg at the 2024 Academy Museum of Motion Pictures Gala. Credit:

Emma McIntyre/Getty

Steven Spielberg, welcome to the halls of history.

The visionary director of timeless classics like *Saving Private Ryan *and *E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial *officially achieved EGOT status on Sunday, after winning his first Grammy Award for producing *Music by John Williams*, which won Best Music Film.

Spielberg now joins the ranks of Mel Brooks, Rita Moreno, Mike Nichols, and Whoopi Goldberg in the exclusive club of artists who have been recognized as the top minds in their respective fields with trophies from the Emmys, Grammys, Oscars, and Tonys.

Steven Spielberg wins an Emmy for 'Band of Brothers' in 2002.

Spielberg's first major awards win came three decades into his career. *Schindler's List*, his historical drama following Oskar Schindler, a German industrialist who rescued over 1,000 Jewish refugees from extermination during the Holocaust by putting them to work in his factories, swept the Oscars in 1994, winning Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay, among others.

The '90s would become a hotbed of awards activity for the 79-year-old Ohio native. Spielberg won Best Director again in 1999 for *Saving Private Ryan *and his first Emmy in 1996 for executive producing *A Pinky & the Brain Christmas*, though he'd already taken home a Daytime Emmy Award for producing *Tiny Toon Adventures *in 1991.

Stars who are EGOT winners: Elton John, Whoopi Goldberg, Audrey Hepburn, more

See all the winners at the 2026 Grammy Awards

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Spielberg has so far won a total of four Primetime Emmys, seven Daytime Emmys, and a special Sports Emmy in 2025 for directing and narrating "Land of Stories," a short film that aired on NBC during the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

He achieved the hardest of all awards to net for folks with a film directing persuasion - a Tony - in 2022. Spielberg joined fellow A-listers Mindy Kaling, RuPaul, Jennifer Hudson, and others in producing the Broadway musical *A Strange Loop*, which won Best Musical at that year's ceremony celebrating excellence in theater arts. That win also secured Hudson her EGOT.****

Steven Spielberg wins Best Director and Best Picture for 'Schindler's List' at the 1994 Academy Awards.

DAN GROSHONG/AFP via Getty

*Music by John Williams *is a conventional biopic of the legendary composer who has worked many times with Spielberg, scoring some of his most iconic films, from *Jaws* to *Close Encounters of the Third Kind* to *Schindler's List*.****The film was up against documentaries about the new wave band Devo and songwriter Diane Warren, as well as the Lego-animated Pharrell Williams' doc *Piece by Piece*, and a concert film featuring English crooner Raye at Royal Albert Hall.

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