One of Disney’s favorite songwriters reached a new level of human achievement this week, with Billboard reports Alan Menken recently won a Daytime Emmy for composing “Waiting In The Wings” for Disney Tangled: the series with composer Glenn Slater. That Emmy wins, during the day or otherwise, makes Menken the 16th person to achieve an EGOT, which, for those who somehow don’t know, indicates that someone has won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony, not counting fees. awards. The basic concept of an EGOT is heavy on composers and songwriters, as it is they who win the Grammys, but that doesn’t make Menken’s achievement less deserved. Just counting his Disney work, he made music for The little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Tangled upand Hercules, all of which have great music (especially Hercules, who had a better soundtrack than all of them combined, and we’re willing to fight anyone and everyone for that.) He even composed the song “Star Spangled Man” by Captain Americaand yet 15 people won EGOT before him.
And yet … the fact that he’s a daytime Emmy must hurt a bit, right? Until you win a Primetime (or “Real”) Emmy, you will always have that little asterisk next to your name like Whoopi Goldberg and Robert Lopez, who also got their EGOTs with Daytime Emmys. He’s still an awesome achieclaim that most of us could never dream, but isn’t it? a little less impressive than John Legend’s EGOT or Audrey Hepburn’s EGOT? Actually, Hepburn’s Grammy was for a spoken word album, making it seem like an asterisk as much as a daytime Emmy. You really should have tried to compose some Disney songs.
.
