Lea Michele

Lea Michele Sarfati was born on August 29, 1986, in the Bronx, New York, the only child of Edith Thomasina Sarfati, a retired nurse of Italian American descent with roots in Rome and Naples, and Mark David Sarfati, a real estate agent and former delicatessen owner whose Sephardic Jewish ancestors were Judaeo-Spanish speakers from Thessaloniki, Greece. Michele grew up practicing her mother's Catholic faith, and her father attended mass with the family. The family relocated from the Bronx to Tenafly, New Jersey, when Michele was four years old, while also maintaining a Manhattan apartment for use during her Broadway engagements. She attended Rockland Country Day School in Congers, New York, for her elementary education and later enrolled at Tenafly High School, where she participated in volleyball, debate, and choir. She adopted her middle name professionally from her very first audition, deliberately omitting her surname to avoid difficulties with its pronunciation.

Michele made her Broadway debut in 1995 at the age of eight, stepping into the role of Cosette in Les Misérables after auditioning on a whim to support a friend, singing "Angel of Music" from The Phantom of the Opera. She also understudied the role of Gavroche during that run. In 1997, she relocated to Toronto, where she was homeschooled while performing the role of the Little Girl in the original Toronto cast of Ragtime before that production transferred to Broadway, where she continued in the same role. During that period she also voiced Christina, a main character in the animated film Buster & Chauncey's Silent Night, released on October 13, 1998. During the summers of 2000, 2001, and 2002, Michele attended Stagedoor Manor, a performing arts training center in the Catskills, where she participated in the touring troupe Our Time Cabaret and performed in productions of Side by Side by Sondheim and The Who's Tommy. Her final summer at the camp was redirected when she was cast as Wendla Bergmann in a workshop of Spring Awakening, a role she would carry all the way to Broadway. Although she was later accepted to New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, she chose to continue her professional stage career instead.

In 2004, Michele joined the Broadway revival of Fiddler on the Roof, portraying Shprintze and understudying the role of Chava, and she appeared on the production's cast recording. She then originated the role of Wendla Bergmann in the Broadway production of Spring Awakening, which opened in December 2006, having developed the role through early workshops and an Off-Broadway run, including a February 2005 performance at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. Her work in Spring Awakening earned her a Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Actress in a Musical in 2007. Around the time the show moved to Broadway, she was offered the role of Éponine Thénardier in a Les Misérables revival but chose to remain with Spring Awakening. She departed the Broadway cast in May 2008 alongside co-star Jonathan Groff. That August, she portrayed Éponine in the Hollywood Bowl's Les Misérables concert, directed by Richard Jay-Alexander, appearing alongside Brian Stokes Mitchell and John Lloyd Young.

Beginning in 2009, Michele starred as Rachel Berry, the female lead of the Fox musical comedy-drama series Glee, a role written specifically for her by co-creator Ryan Murphy. She remained with the series until it concluded in 2015. The role brought her the 2009 Satellite Award for Best Actress in a Television Series Musical or Comedy, as well as nominations for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Television Series Musical or Comedy and the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series. Time magazine included her on its list of the 100 Most Influential People in the World for 2010, and Billboard presented her with its first-ever Triple Threat Award in December of that year. Music recorded for Glee produced multiple Billboard chart hits and earned Michele a Grammy Award nomination. She made her feature film debut in New Year's Eve in 2011.

In 2012, Michele signed with Columbia Records and released her debut single, "Cannonball," in 2013. Her debut studio album, Louder, followed in 2014, debuting at number four on the Billboard 200. A second studio album, Places, arrived in 2017. She released Christmas in the City in 2019 and a fourth studio album, Forever, in 2021. She also published two books during this period: Brunette Ambition in 2014 and You First: Journal Your Way to Your Best Life in 2015. On the television side, she starred as Hester Ulrich on the Fox series Scream Queens from 2015 to 2016 and as Valentina Barella on the ABC sitcom The Mayor in 2017.

Michele returned to Broadway in 2022, starring as Fanny Brice in the revival of Funny Girl. In 2025, she stars as Florence in the Broadway revival of Chess, appearing opposite Aaron Tveit and Nicholas Christopher.