Broadway icon Joe Mantello gives $1M to establish scholarship, support student productions in UNCSA School of Drama

The School of Drama at UNCSA has announced a $1 million gift from acclaimed actor and two-time Tony Award-winning director of stage and screen Joe Mantello, a graduate of the school’s class of ’84. The gift will fund two key initiatives for the school: The Joe Mantello Endowed Scholarship in Drama, a prestigious scholarship designed to attract and support top students, and the Joe Mantello Creative Catalyst Endowed Fund for Drama, a fund dedicated to supporting student-driven productions.

The gift is the largest alumni gift on record for the School of Drama and will be vital in helping to prepare graduates for meaningful careers in the arts, following in the footsteps of alumni such as Mantello.

Joe Mantello / Photo credit: Dave Krysl

The Joe Mantello Endowed Scholarship in Drama will be a full-ride scholarship that will support one recipient at a time through their four years of undergraduate study at UNCSA. Prospective recipients will be identified through the School of Drama’s rigorous national audition process and selected by the dean of Drama on the basis of their skill, dedication and demonstrated commitment to their art form. The inaugural scholarship will be awarded to a student matriculating in fall 2025.

The Joe Mantello Creative Catalyst Endowed Fund for Drama will support student-driven original productions that will give emerging artists the space to express their artistic visions and exercise their creative skills. This fund will support and augment existing programs on campus such as Keys to the Kingdom (an entire season in the fourth year that is programmed, produced, directed, acted and often written or devised by students) that elevate student-produced work and prepare students to graduate with deep experience in theater making and creative discovery.

“We are profoundly grateful to Joe for this gift,” said UNCSA Chancellor Brian Cole. “His career has been a case study in creative excellence, multifaceted talent and visionary perspective. This gift will help the School of Drama attract the most talented prospective students, befitting of the program’s top-tier worldwide reputation, and build on its remarkable tradition of artistic rigor and industry relevance.”

“Joe has been at the forefront of the industry for decades, and knows better than anyone how much the world of professional theater has evolved and continues to evolve,” said UNCSA Dean of Drama John Langs. “By investing in our students’ ability to create and produce original, independent work that augments and complements our existing drama curriculum, Joe is helping to prepare actors to take charge of their careers in this changing industry, training generations of actors and directors to explore the human condition and create work that reaches new audiences, just as he has done throughout his extraordinary career.”

Class of 1984 from UNCSA 2024 Homecoming / Photo: Mark Jabourian

Joe Mantello with his classmates from the Class of 1984 at Homecoming 2024 / Photo: Mark Jabourian

Originally from Rockford, Illinois, Mantello fondly remembers his time at UNCSA. “I thought I had died and gone to heaven,” he recounted in 2024. “Just the general idea that I could spend an entire day thinking about nothing but making theater was incredible.”

When he first arrived in New York, Mantello worked alongside fellow UNCSA alumni Mary-Louise Parker and Peter Hedges as cofounders of The Edge Theater. “I took my first bow in this city standing next to Joe Mantello, pie smeared across our widely grinning mugs,” Parker told The New York Times in 2016 of their inaugural performance, Hedges’ “The Age of Pie.” “We started our company with the unwavering ambition to create exciting and truthful theater and made our work wherever we could.”

In the years that followed, Mantello’s theater career gained steam, with roles in productions like Paula Vogel’s “The Baltimore Waltz” at the Circle Repertory Company. In 1993, he received acclaim and the first of many Tony nominations for his role as Louis Ironson in Tony Kushner’s “Angels in America: Millennium Approaches,” a role he reprised in Kushner’s follow-up, “Angels in America: Perestroika.” He also starred in the 2011 Broadway revival of Larry Kramer’s “The Normal Heart” — receiving another Tony nomination — and appeared in the 2014 HBO adaptation of the play.

In his work as a director, Mantello has simply stunned. His early directing work off-Broadway included Hedges’ “Imagining Brad” and Terrence McNally’s “Love! Valour! Compassion!” which he continued to direct when it moved to Broadway, earning him his first Tony nomination as a director. Within a decade, he had transitioned primarily to directing, and he soon received his first Tony for his work on “Take Me Out” in 2003, followed by another Tony for his direction of “Assassins” the following year. In between those two projects, he also found time to direct what would soon become one of Broadway’s all-time blockbusters.

In October 2003, “Wicked” premiered at the Gershwin Theatre with Mantello at the helm, and the show continues to run today, the fourth-longest-running Broadway production of all time. His name still appears in the musical’s playbill, as well as in the credits for the smash hit film adaptation. Mantello was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 2018 and continues to make exceptional work on stage, including his direction of Samuel Hunter’s “Little Bear Ridge Road” starring Laurie Metcalf at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre last summer.

About the School of Drama

Frequently ranked as one of the best drama schools in the world by industry leading publications, the school prepares talented young artists for successful careers on stage, online, and in film and television. Conservatory training grounded in classical values adds technical skills to shape creatively inspired and versatile actors who are in-demand in today’s evolving entertainment landscape. Students perform constantly in both small workshops and major productions across the theatrical repertory. An outstanding resident faculty, led by Dean John Langs, gives personal attention to their students’ growth. Students receive invaluable on-camera training and opportunities to explore creative entrepreneurship while offered coveted exposure to industry professionals in the major hubs of the entertainment industry in America.

In addition to Parker, Hedges and Mantello, UNCSA’s prominent School of Drama alumni include Jake Lacy (“White Lotus”), Anna Camp (“Pitch Perfect”), Billy Magnussen (“No Time to Die,” “Aladdin”); Stephen McKinley Henderson (“Dune,” “Fences”); Anthony Mackie (“The Falcon and the Winter Solider”); Wesley Taylor (“SpongeBob Square Pants: The Musical,” “Only Murders in the Building”); Krys Marshall (“For All Mankind”); Elizabeth Lail (“Gossip Girl,” “You”); Dane DeHaan (“Oppenheimer,” “American Primeval”); Diedrich Bader (“Veep,” “Better Things,” “American Housewife”); Orin Wolf (producer, “Illinoise,” “The Band’s Visit”); J.T. Rodgers (writer, “Oslo,” “Tokyo Vice”); Chris Parnell (“Saturday Night Live”); Isaac Powell (“West Side Story”); and many others.

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January 22, 2025