罗伯特·洛佩斯

Robert Lopez (born February 23, 1975) is an American songwriter, best known for co-creating the musicals Avenue Q (with Jeff Marx) and The Book of Mormon (with Trey Parker and Matt Stone). He co-wrote songs for the Disney animated films Frozen, Frozen 2 and Coco with his wife, Kristen Anderson-Lopez. He is signed to Disney Music Publishing.

He is one of the few people to win the EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony). He is the only person to have won all four awards more than once, having won two Oscars, three Tonys, three Grammys, and four Emmys. With a second set of competitive wins beginning with his June 27, 2010, Emmy and concluding with his March 4, 2018, Academy Award, he broke his own 'fastest to complete' record, establishing a new fastest EGOT interval at 7 years and 8 months. This was later broken by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (7 years 7 months).

Early life

Robert Lopez was born in Manhattan, to Katherine (née Lowe) and Frank Lopez. He is of Filipino descent through his father (who was born on a ship in the middle of the ocean after departing Manila); his paternal grandfather was Filipino, and his paternal grandmother was of half Filipino and half Scottish-American descent (both originally resided in Manila). Frank was director of publications for NYU Langone Medical Center.

Lopez spent his childhood in Greenwich Village, except for a year in Massachusetts while his father worked for Clark University. Upon returning to Manhattan, "it was a fluke" that he started piano lessons at Greenwich House Music School. The apartment they were subletting had a piano; his mother asked if he wanted to take lessons, and he said yes. At age seven, his parents bought him a piano, he saw his first Broadway show (A Chorus Line) and he wrote his first song, "Oy Vey, What a Day". At around age 12, he briefly moved from piano to saxophone, and took composition courses at other schools. Influences included Billy Joel and Stephen Sondheim.

Lopez attended Hunter College Elementary School, Hunter College High School and Yale University where he graduated in 1997 with a BA in English. At Yale, he wrote three plays (two of which were musicals) and was a member of the Yale Spizzwinks a cappella group. Influences included Vincent Scully, John Hollander and Harold Bloom. He took Bloom's Shakespeare class and was interested by his idea of the Bible as literature. Bloom encouraged him to read The Book of Mormon. During his time at Yale, he vaguely hoped to make a living writing musicals and "had no [other] career options"; towards that end, he avoided courses that would prepare him for a career in something more secure like law or medicine.

Career

1998–2004: Avenue Q

Upon graduating from Yale, Lopez moved back in with his parents and brother in Greenwich Village, where he lived for four years until he was able to earn enough money writing songs for Theatreworks USA to rent an apartment of his own. During this period, he took temporary jobs at companies like Pfizer and worked as a weekend receptionist for his old music school, Greenwich House.