Joel Perez

Joel Japheth Perez is an American actor born on June 12, 1986, in Boston, Massachusetts, who grew up in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Of Puerto Rican descent, Perez was introduced to singing through his father's Pentecostal ministry. He appeared in his first theatrical role in eighth grade, playing The Herald in Fellowship Christian Academy's production of Cinderella, and later took on the role of Conrad Birdie in his high school's production of Bye Bye Birdie at Central Catholic High School in Lawrence, from which he graduated in 2004.

Perez attended Tufts University, where he participated in productions of Children of Eden and Hair, studied for a semester at the British American Drama Academy in London, and spent a junior-year term at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre. He graduated from Tufts in 2008, the same year he received the Goddard Rhetorical Prize and was accepted into the American Theater Wing Program Springboard NYC. During that period, he connected with Stage Source and pursued auditions for In the Heights and the Williamstown Theater Festival. After six auditions spanning roughly a year and a half, he secured a place in the national tour of In the Heights, the Tony Award-winning musical, which marked the beginning of his professional career in 2010. While on tour, he also appeared in the film BoyBand.

Between Broadway engagements, Perez obtained a real estate license and worked as an agent, and also served as a production assistant on the PBS program History Detectives. His Broadway career, which spans 2009 to 2015, includes credits in In the Heights and Fun Home. His involvement with Fun Home began at the Sundance Theater Lab in Jacksonville, Florida, where he met composer Jeanine Tesori and book writer Lisa Kron while working on Stuck Elevator. The two invited him to join their adaptation of Alison Bechdel's work, and in 2013 Perez played the roles of Mark, Pete, Roy, and Bobby Jeremy — one of only two parts written for men — in the world premiere production at the Public Theater off-Broadway. In April 2015, the production transferred to Broadway's Circle in the Square Theatre, where it won five Tony Awards.

Beyond his Broadway work, Perez played Vittorio Vidal, Daddy Brubeck, and Herman in The New Group's off-Broadway revival of Sweet Charity, a performance for which he received the 2017 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical. He has also participated in Broadway Sings, an annual concert founded in 2011 by Corey Mach that reimagines pop music.

Perez has been a member of the Broken Box Mime Theater Company in New York since its founding in 2011, a company that grew out of a student-run mime troupe called HYPE at Tufts University. The ensemble's work is collaborative rather than playwright-driven, and its pieces are frequently accompanied by contemporary music. Broken Box received the 2014 New York Innovative Theater Award for Outstanding Ensemble.

In addition to his stage work, Perez co-wrote the short film Beautiful, FL with his husband, Adrian Ferbeyre, for Disney's Launchpad series. He also starred in the film as Copernicus Cruz, a judge in an ice cream competition. Directed by Gabriel Ortega, the film was released on Disney+ on September 29, 2023. Perez has been openly gay since 2007 and has been married to Ferbeyre since 2019.