Zac Efron

Zachary David Alexander Efron was born on October 18, 1987, in San Luis Obispo, California. Encouraged by his father to perform in community theatre at age eleven, Efron appeared in productions of Gypsy, Peter Pan, and The Music Man, before landing guest roles on television series such as Firefly and ER.

In 2006, Efron was cast as basketball captain Troy Bolton in the Disney Channel original movie High School Musical. The film became an unprecedented global cultural phenomenon, with its soundtrack becoming the best-selling album of 2006 in the United States and catapulting Efron to international superstardom. He reprised his role in High School Musical 2 (2007) and the theatrical release High School Musical 3: Senior Year (2008), which broke box office records for a musical.

Determined to transcend teen idol status, Efron demonstrated exceptional dramatic and comedic range, starring in 17 Again (2009), Richard Linklater's Me and Orson Welles (2008), Neighbors (2014), and the hit musical The Greatest Showman (2017) alongside Hugh Jackman. In 2021, he won a Daytime Emmy Award for his Netflix environmental documentary series Down to Earth with Zac Efron. In 2023, Efron received universal critical acclaim for his physically astonishing, deeply vulnerable portrayal of real-life wrestler Kevin Von Erich in Sean Durkin's tragedy The Iron Claw. In December 2023, Efron was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.