And that's what you missed: Every 'Glee' star who's won a Tony Award
Jonathan Groff; Alex Newell; Darren Criss
The Glee cast featured some of the most talented musical theater performers to ever grace the TV screen.
With an iconic run between 2009 and 2015, Glee was centered on group of young performers as the members of a high school Glee Club in Lima, Ohio. The show was all about how much talent and potential these high schoolers had, dreaming up big futures for many of them.
In the series finale of Glee, the character of Rachel (Lea Michele) goes on to win her first Tony Award, which did set the tone for what fans could expect from the careers of some of the stars.
The show also featured numerous guest stars, including Broadway stars and musical theater legends. Many of those stars had Tony Awards before appearing on the show, but have also continued to produce great work that earns them even more nominations.
As of 2025, 12 performers who played characters on Glee have Tony Awards, including five members of the New Directions.
Scroll through to discover which cast members over the years have won Tony Awards — starting with the latest addition to this list!
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Darren Criss joined the Glee cast in season 2 as Blaine Anderson, a member of the glee club at a rival all-boys school called Dalton Academy. Eventually, he transferred to William McKinley High to join the New Directions and started dating Kurt. In 2025, Criss won a Tony for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical for Maybe Happy Ending.
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Jonathan Groff starred in Glee as Jesse St. James, a rival to the New Directions and on-again-off-again boyfriend to Rachel. Groff was first nominated for a Tony for his role as Melchior in Spring Awakening in 2007. Lea Michele — Groff's love interest in that musical and eventual Glee costar as well — was not nominated, alas.
Groff was then nominated again for playing King George III in Hamilton, and eventually won his first Tony for starring in Merrily We Roll Along in 2024.
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After appearing on The Glee Project, Alex Newell joined the season 3 cast of Glee as trans student Unique Adams, and subsequently joined the New Directions in season 4. In 2023, Newell originated the role of Lulu in the Broadway musical Shucked and won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for the role. Along with J. Harrison Ghee, who won for Some Like It Hot that same night, Newell became the first out nonbinary performer to win a Tony.
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Ali Stroker is another person who went from The Glee Project reality competition series to getting cast on Glee. In 2016, Stroker won a Tony for Best Featured Actress in a Musical for her role as Ado Annie in Oklahoma!. She was the first wheelchair user to win a Tony Award for acting.
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Jenna Ushkowitz was a member of the original New Directions as the character Tina Cohen-Chang, and stayed on the show until it ended. Over the years, Ushkowitz has won two Tony Awards as a producer: One trophy for Best Revival of a Musical, for Once On This Island, in 2018, and another trophy for Best Play, for The Inheritance, in 2020.
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Brian Stokes Mitchell has been nominated for four Tonys overall, and won for Best Actor in a Musical for his performance as Fred Graham/Petruchio in Kiss Me, Kate in 2000. On Glee, the actor played LeRoy Berry, one of Rachel's gay dads.
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Broadway legend Kristin Chenoweth won a Tony for Best Featured Actress in a Musical for her performance as Sally Brown in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown in 1999. She's been nominated for two other Tonys for her roles as Glinda in Wicked and Lily Garland in On the Twentieth Century. On Glee, she played April Rhodes, a washed-up former glee club singer who never graduated from high school and joins the New Directions as an adult.
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Idina Menzel is another massive Broadway legend who's appeared on Glee. On the show, Menzel played Rachel's birth mom, Shelby Corcoran. She was nominated for her first Tony in 1996 for playing Maureen in Rent, and then won for originating the role of Elphaba in Wicked (2004). Then years later, in 2014, Menzel and was nominated again for If/Then.
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On Glee, EGOT winner Whoopi Goldberg played Carmen Tibideaux, the Dean of Vocal Performance and Song Interpretation at NYADA, the performing arts school that Rachel and Kurt attend after graduating from high school. In real life, she's been nominated for three Tonys as a producer, winning in 2002 for Best Musical for Thoroughly Modern Millie.
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Neil Patrick Harris appeared in one episode of Glee as Bryan Ryan, a former high school rival of Will Schuester's who's now a board member of Lima Public Schools and is seeking to defund the glee club. He won a Tony in 2014 for Best Actor in a Musical for Hedwig and the Angry Inch.
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Legendary actor and singer Carol Burnett played Doris Sylvester on Glee — none other than Sue Sylvester's mother! After being nominated for Best Actress in a Musical for Once Upon a Mattress in 1960 and Best Actress in a Play in 1996 for Moon Over Buffalo, Burnett won a Special Tony Award in 1969.
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Helen Mirren played the inner voice of Becky Jackson, a member of the Cheerios who had Down syndrome, on Glee. Over the years, Mirren has been nominated for three Tony Awards for Best Actress in a Play. In 2015, the actress won for her performance in The Audience.
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