Playbill: As part of Playbill's Back to School week, take a look at our annual report on the colleges and universities with the most alumni performing on Broadway in the 2025-26 Broadway season. Below you'll find this year's top 20 most represented schools on Broadway (well technically 22 due to ties). Take a look and see if your school—or a school you're considering attending—made the list!
5 comments:
Wow thats a lot of actors. Every time I see these kinds of lists I find it really interesting how much location plays a role in who ends up in these broadway shows. Almost all the colleges listed are either on the east coast or very very very close to it. I think for actors location is the most important part for getting jobs because just to get a gig on broadway you have to audition, and to audition you have to be in the room, and to get in the room you have to be on the east coast!! Being so far from these big name theatres is a huge disadvantage for anyone who wants to be the in the business because travel is very expensive. I also think thats why everyone moves to new york after college anyway. I think its a lot easier for designers to work remotely and get jobs even when they are far from the center of the action.
That list is incredibly lengthy and shocking to see the number of performers that come from a select few programs. Not surprisingly most of the schools on the list are east coast colleges due to the proximity of these programs to Broadway. The close proximity allows for professors to continue working in the industry while teaching and allows students more opportunities to network and/or get seen in audition rooms. Additionally the alumni networks at the prestigious schools are a great resource for the next students when they try to make it in the industry. It is also interesting how a lot of the schools on the list for acting alum are similar to those on the list for creatives but not exclusively reflecting how not all theatre schools have as amazing programs for both the techs and the actors as we have here.
There are just so many more people listed as actors after seeing the list of the creative team. I guess this makes sense because, for a show, the creative team is limited to a small group of people working on the design, since there can only be so many people sharing ideas and putting them together, while a performance needs many actors to play the roles and carry the narrative to the audience. The role of physical location seems to play a big part in Broadway connections, as being in close proximity to New York seems to allow more access to opportunities and resources in Broadway. CMU and AMDA College of Performing Arts, both located in New York, have one of the most actors in Broadway. It’s also interesting to think about how these connections can continue within a school’s program, with alumni already working in Broadway potentially helping current students build connections and find opportunities.
Wow, there are so many actors from each of these college programs. I am shocked to see so many names. I'm reading this right after the creative article, and there are like five times as many names per college for each show. But this is fantastic. I really think it's great to see artists succeeding. I think musical theater and plays in any form of performance art are beautiful, and I'm happy to see all of these people succeeding in what they love to do. It's also so exciting to recognize some of these names of people that I went to school with at Carnegie Mellon. I'm very proud of these people and everyone else who is living out their dream. I wish this article showed us who they played in these shows, just because I'm curious to put a name to a role. I was also shocked at how many BFA programs there are for acting and MT students. I forget how many programs exist.
I know CMU has their alumni currently on Broadway posted in the lobby so I clicked this article because I was curious to see where other current stars came from. I wasn’t surprised to see CMU up there but I had no idea they were fifth. When looking at the number of people in the lobby I have no scope for if that is a lot or average from a performing arts school but it is a confidence booster that it is a lot. Most performers come from New York schools, which I found not very surprising, but there was not one West coast school mentioned. This has me curious if most performers on that side of the country stay over there or focus on traveling for some reason. It may be that distance is just the biggest factor and so many do not upstart their whole life and move to New York.
Post a Comment