Corbin Bleu

Early life and education

Corbin Bleu was born in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, the son of Martha (née Callari) and David Reivers (born 1958), an actor. His mother is Italian-American and his father is Jamaican-American. He has three younger sisters. As a child, Bleu studied dance for several years, focusing on ballet and jazz. His great-uncle is actor Joseph Callari.

Bleu appeared in television commercials starting at age two, for products such as Life cereal, Bounty, Hasbro and Nabisco. He began taking jazz and ballet classes, usually as the only boy in the class. By age four he was a model with the Ford Modeling Agency in New York. He appeared in print ads for stores such as Macy's, Gap, Target and Toys R Us and in fashion spreads in Child, Parents, and American Baby magazines, as well as having his image on toys and game packaging.

At age six, Bleu appeared in his first professional theater production, at The Town Hall. This three-concert series, created, written, and hosted by Scott Siegel, took place over one weekend and included a tribute to David Merrick. Bleu played an abandoned homeless mute in the play Tiny Tim is Dead.

Bleu graduated from Los Angeles County High School for the Arts. He trained in dancing at the Debbie Allen Dance Academy and attended the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts as a theater major, following in his mother's footsteps. Bleu graduated from high school in 2007 and was admitted to Stanford University, but declined to matriculate.

Acting career

1996–2005: Early career

Bleu moved with his family from New York to Los Angeles in 1996. He worked steadily in episodic television and feature film roles, including a recurring role on the short-lived ABC police drama High Incident and a guest star appearance on ER. He also appeared in some films, like Beach Movie (1998) and the sci-fi thriller Soldier (1998). His feature films from this period include the Tim Allen comedy Galaxy Quest (1999), the comedy Mystery Men (1999), and the drama Family Tree (1999), Bleu also had roles in Malcolm & Eddie, as Matthew, and Cover Me: Based on the True Life of an FBI Family (2000), as Nick Elderby, and smaller roles like in the comedy series Nickelodeon's show The Amanda Show.

Additionally, Bleu was developing his dance skills and in 2001 began intensive training at the Debbie Allen Dance Academy. There he undertook a full gamut of dance instruction, including ballet, jazz, tap, modern, hip-hop, African, break dance, salsa, flamenco and ballroom. Debbie Allen, the choreographer who starred in the TV series Fame, told Dance Spirit magazine: "I think [Bleu] really has a career. Success is one thing, but a career is a much longer, broader journey".

Bleu attended the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts, a magnet school like the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, which was portrayed in the movie and television series Fame and which Bleu's mother attended. During his freshman year, he won his first sizable film role in the teen action caper Catch That Kid (2004), about a girl named Maddie Phillips and her friends Austin and Gus who decide to rob a bank after learning that money is needed to aid her ailing father Tom Phillips (Sam Robards), alongside Kristen Stewart and Max Thieriot. It was a box-office flop, grossing $10 million, but served as an important step for Bleu, who was still building his acting career. During high school, he performed in student productions of Footloose and Grease, winning the honor of Theatre Student of the Year.

In the summer of 2004 Bleu landed a starring role in the television series Flight 29 Down, alongside Allen Alvarado, Hallee Hirsh, Lauren Storm, Jeremy James Kissner, Johnny Pacar and Kristy Wu, which aired for three seasons on the Discovery Kids network. The program, a juvenile version of the ABC series Lost, concerned a group of teenagers stranded on a tropical island after their plane crashes. Bleu played Nathan McHugh, a Boy Scout whose leadership skills do not quite measure up to his self-confidence.

2006–2008: High School Musical and breakthrough

Bleu's next television project was the Disney Channel original film High School Musical (2006), in which he portrayed the basketball player Chad Danforth, who tries to persuade his teammate Troy Bolton (Zac Efron) to give up his interest in theater and focus on winning a basketball championship. High School Musical premiered on January 20, 2006; with an audience of 7.7 million television viewers, it was the Disney Channel's most successful TV movie up to that point. The film, which also starred Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel, Vanessa Hudgens, and Monique Coleman, was a major success and helped Bleu gain recognition among teenage audiences. The film's soundtrack was certified quadruple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

He joined co-stars on the 51-date High School Musical: The Concert (2006–2007) tour to promote the film, work on the second film in the series began, and Bleu was confirmed to be returning for the sequel. High School Musical 2 (2007) was released on August 17, 2007. The premiere was seen by over 17.2 million viewers in the U.S., almost 10 million more than its predecessor, making it the highest-rated Disney Channel movie of all time. Disney Channel aired a weekly program called Road to High School Musical 2, beginning on June 8, 2007, and leading up to the premiere of High School Musical 2 in August. The show offered viewers a behind-the-scenes look into the movie's production. The world premiere of the opening number "What Time Is It" was on Radio Disney on May 25, 2007, and "I Don't Dance" premiered on August 14, 2007. The film was generally well received by critics, gaining a score of 77/100 at Metacritic and 82% on Rotten Tomatoes. It broke opening-weekend records and grossed over $250 million worldwide. Its soundtrack, featuring many contributions from Bleu, sold over three million copies in the U.S. alone. "I Don't Dance", a duet with Lucas Grabeel, became his first top-40 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It was named the official theme song of the 2007 Little League World Series. During this time, Bleu began singing on soundtracks for the Disney Channel, and released a cover of "Two Worlds" (2007) to promote Tarzan.

In 2007, Bleu starred in his next film, the Disney Channel original Jump In!, which aired on January 12, 2007. Directed by Paul Hoen, the movie revolves around a young boy, Izzy Daniels, who trains regularly to try to follow in his father's Kenneth Daniels (David Reivers)' footsteps and win the Golden Glove, an amateur boxing tournament. Bleu played Izzy and Keke Palmer portrayed Mary Thomas, his friend who has a crush on him. Again, Disney scored a crossover hit with the Jump In! soundtrack album, released in January 2007, on which Bleu sings the track "Push It to the Limit". Reaching the screens on the Disney Channel that January, Jump In! was a major hit among young viewers and quickly became the network's highest-rated premiere, breaking the record set by The Cheetah Girls 2 in 2006. Its soundtrack was also a commercial hit, achieving gold status from the RIAA three months after its release. Bleu appeared in the Atlanta group Small Change's music video "Don't Be Shy", featuring Chani and Lil' JJ.

2009–present: Continued work

The following year, Bleu played the lead role in the film called Free Style (2009). It concerns Cale Bryant, an eighteen-year-old man who tries to find himself by winning the Amateur National Motocross Championships. Free Style performed poorly in the box office, having only grossed $720,000 from a $10 million budget. Over the next few years, Bleu's television roles included the drama series The CW Television Network's show The Beautiful Life: TBL. The series was subsequently cancelled on September 25, 2009, after televising 2 episodes. In December 2009, the technology company HP became the show's sponsor and began airing the show's five episodes on YouTube. Also in 2009, he was a voice actor in Beyond All Boundaries, and appeared on Entertainment Tonight and The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet. Also in 2009, he was the voice of Coltrane in the premiere two episodes of Disney's Phineas and Ferb.

Corbin Bleu made his Broadway stage debut in 2010 as the lead character, bodega-owner Usnavi de la Vega, in the critically acclaimed musical In the Heights. and guest starred in one episode of The Good Wife as DJ Javier Berlin in October 2010. in 2010, Corbin starred in the short comedy film I Owe My Life to Corbin Bleu, alongside Andrew Caldwell, Drake Bell, Sarah Hyland, Ryan Pinkston, Sterling Knight, Matt Prokop, Matt Shively and Josh Sussman. In 2011, he performed the voice of Lou in The Little Engine That Could (2011). From August 5–7, Bleu performed in the musical Hairspray as Seaweed J. Stubbs at the Hollywood Bowl, alongside Nick Jonas, Harvey Fierstein, Marissa Jaret Winokur, Drew Carey and Darlene Love. and he performed the voice of Flip in Tonka Chuck and Friends: Big Air Dare.

In 2012, Bleu also had a role in and co-produced the indie horror anthology Scary or Die (2012), a collection of five short horror films. In 2012, he joined the cast of Godspell as Jesus Christ beginning April 17 at the Circle in the Square Theatre. He joined co-stars on the 66th Annual Tony Awards, to performing "Day by Day" and "Light of the World" at Beacon Theatre, with Neil Patrick Harris as the host. During this time, he recorded the duet "If I Never Knew You" (2012), with Anna Maria Perez de Tagle to promote Pocahontas. He guest starred in one episode of Blue Bloods as Officer Blake in 2012. In 2012, he performed the voice of Drew in Twinkle Toes, Bleu starred in the drama film To Write Love on Her Arms (originally titled Renee) in 2012, with Kat Dennings, Chad Michael Murray and Rupert Friend. The film began production in Orlando, Florida, in February 2011.

Music career

Bleu's first professionally recorded song was titled "Circles" or "Circles in My Mind" for his then TV show, Flight 29 Down. Bleu signed a contract with Hollywood Records, a Disney-owned label. His debut album Another Side, was released in May 2007. The album debuted at No. 36 on the Billboard 200 album charts, selling 18,000 in its first week. Bleu, who admires Prince, Michael Jackson, and Justin Timberlake, cowrote five songs on the album. One of those tracks was titled "Shake It Off", an ode to the musician Prince. In 2007 he toured in support of Another Side with the teen sister duo Aly & AJ.

Bleu worked with Ne-Yo on "I Get Lonely", and with other performers such as Matthew Gerrard and Eric Hudson. A music video for his first single, "Push It to the Limit" premiered on the Disney Channel, and was used to promote the movie Jump In! "Push It to the Limit" reached the Top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100, and his second single, "Deal With It", was originally written and sung by Jay Sean. He later gave it to Bleu, whose version of the song features background vocals by Sean. The song went on to earn Sean a BMI Songwriter Award. Bleu sang the duet "Still There for Me" with Vanessa Hudgens for his debut album Another Side.

Bleu toured with fellow High School Musical cast members from late November 2006 to late January 2007 in High School Musical: The Concert, and with Drake Bell and Aly & AJ performing in about 40 different cities. To promote his debut album, Bleu performed at the Nextfest Summer Tour with Aly & AJ and Drake Bell and special guest Bianca Ryan.

His debut single "Run It Back Again" was featured in the movie Minutemen, on January 22, 2008. The song is also featured on Radio Disney Jams, Vol. 10. Bleu performed at the Crawford County Fair Grandstand with Vanessa Hudgens, on August 18, 2008. A week later, on August 25, Bleu performed at the Michigan State Fair with Raven-Symoné. His second album Speed of Light was released on March 10, 2009, via Hollywood Records. The album's first single, "Moments That Matter", was performed by Bleu at Kids' Inaugural: "We Are the Future".

In 2017, Bleu signed a one-album recording contract with Ghostlight Records to distribute his Holiday Inn, The New Irving Berlin Musical soundtrack music, was released digitally on June 2, 2017. The album featured twenty-one songs, and was produced by Kurt Deutsch with Todd Whitelock serving as coproducer and Universal Stage Productions as executive producer. Bleu later signed a two-album recording contract with Ghostlight Records to distribute his Kiss Me, Kate soundtrack music, the 24th cast album recording for Roundabout Theatre Company, since launching the musical theatre program with She Loves Me in 1993.

Personal life

Bleu has been a supporter of Do Something. On March 16, 2010, he was added to the "Broadway Wall of Fame". His portrait was unveiled at Tony's Di Napoli Restaurant in New York City. In 2011, Bleu began dating actress Sasha Clements. On October 15, 2014, they became engaged, and they married on July 23, 2016.

Public image

In 2013, an MIT study discovered that Bleu was the third most-common biography article subject among all the different language versions of Wikipedia; pages on him were available in 194 languages, placing below only Jesus (214) and Barack Obama (200), and above Confucius (192) and Isaac Newton (191). The contradiction between Bleu's high notability on Wikipedia and low real-life notability comparative to the aforementioned historical figures made the creation of these pages unusual. In 2019, a Reddit user found that these translations were likely done by a single user whose IP addresses on Wikipedia locate to Saudi Arabia. By 2025, Bleu had dropped to number 19 on the list of biographies but saw an increase in Wikipedia notability, being available in 217 languages, surpassing Johann Sebastian Bach, who at the time had pages in 216 languages.

Philanthropy

Bleu has supported various charitable organizations and causes during his career. In 2011, Bleu worked for charities such as Starlight Children's Foundation, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. In May 2011, he attended the Do Something Awards kickoff event.

Filmography

Discography

Studio albums

Another Side (2007)

Speed of Light (2009)

Soundtrack albums

High School Musical (2006)

Jump In! (2007)

High School Musical 2 (2007)

High School Musical 3: Senior Year (2008)

Holiday Inn, The New Irving Berlin Musical (2017)

Kiss Me, Kate (2019)

Concert tours

Headlining

High School Musical: The Concert (2006)

Opening act

Nextfest Summer Tour (Co-headlining with Aly & AJ, Drake Bell and Bianca Ryan) (2007)

Crawford County Fair Grandstand (Co-headlining with Vanessa Hudgens) (2008)

Michigan State Fair (Co-headlining with Raven-Symoné) (2008)

Kids' Inaugural: "We Are the Future" (Co-headlining with Miley Cyrus, Demi Lovato and Jonas Brothers) (2009)

Disney Channel Summer At Sea (Co-headlining with Jonnie and Brookie) (2009)