The Television Academy revealed on Saturday that Barack Obama, a relative unknown in Hollywood, had won an Emmy for narrating his Netflix documentary series “Our Great National Parks.”
The former US president only needs an Oscar and a Tony to complete the prestigious EGOT because he has already won two Grammy Awards for the audiobooks of his memoirs “The Audacity of Hope” and “Dreams from My Father.”
Only 17 people, including Mel Brooks, Whoopi Goldberg, Audrey Hepburn, and most recently Jennifer Hudson, have received an EGOT, according to an entertainment weekly.
One other president had already been awarded an Emmy, Dwight D Eisenhower in 1956, although his was an honorary award.
After leaving office in 2017, both Obama and his wife Michelle have each written best-selling memoirs, and in addition to their non-profit foundation, have established a production company which has inked a major deal with Netflix, reportedly worth tens of millions of dollars.
Their company’s first documentary for the streaming service, ‘American Factory’, won the Oscar for best documentary feature and an Emmy for directing, though the awards went to the filmmakers and not to the Obamas themselves.
Obama’s successor to the presidency, Donald Trump, did not win an Emmy for his reality competition show ‘The Apprentice’, although he was nominated twice.
Other nominees in Obama’s narrator category included former NBA star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (‘Black Patriots: Heroes Of The Civil War’), Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o (‘Serengeti II’) and veteran naturalist David Attenborough (‘The Mating Game’).
Obama also received the Nobel Peace Prize after his 2008 presidential election win, for his “extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”
