Hadestown opened on Broadway in April 2019, won eight Tony Awards including Best Musical, and has been running at the Walter Kerr Theatre for nearly seven years. But the show's story starts earlier: Anais Mitchell and Rachel Chavkin's folk opera retelling of the Orpheus myth premiered Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop in 2016 before transferring to Broadway. Two national tours have since brought the show to audiences across North America.
Over that run, 30 different performers have stepped into the roles of Orpheus and Eurydice Off-Broadway, on Broadway, and on tour. We tracked down the training background for every one of them.
The results tell a different story from what you might expect. Many of these performers never completed a college degree. Several went straight from performing arts high schools to professional work as teenagers. The roles have been filled by child actors who grew up on Broadway stages, a computer scientist who left Mozilla for the theatre, a DACA recipient who became the first full-time Latino Orpheus, and the first Thai actor to lead a Broadway musical.
Every Eurydice at a Glance
Fifteen actors have played Eurydice across the Off-Broadway premiere, Broadway, and two national tours.
| Name | Production | School |
|---|---|---|
| Nabiyah Be | Off-Broadway (Original) | Pace University |
| Eva Noblezada | Broadway (Original) | Northwest School of the Arts |
| Solea Pfeiffer | Broadway | University of Michigan |
| Lola Tung | Broadway (Limited) | Carnegie Mellon (attended) |
| Isa Briones | Broadway | LA County High School for the Arts |
| Maia Reficco | Broadway | Berklee (Young Performers Program) |
| Hailey Kilgore | Broadway | AMDA (attended) |
| Myra Molloy | Broadway | Berklee College of Music |
| Morgan Dudley | Broadway | Hiram High School |
| Jordan Tyson | Broadway (Current) | Marymount Manhattan (attended) |
| Morgan Siobhan Green | 1st National Tour | Bradley Univ. / LIU Post |
| Hannah Whitley | 1st National Tour | Ball State University |
| Amaya Braganza | 1st National Tour | Fordham University |
| Megan Colton | 2nd National Tour | Arcadia HS / Centre Stage Monrovia |
| Hawa Kamara | 2nd National Tour (Current) | Emerson College |
Every Orpheus at a Glance
Fifteen actors have played Orpheus across the Off-Broadway premiere, Broadway, and two national tours.
| Name | Production | School |
|---|---|---|
| Damon Daunno | Off-Broadway (Original) | NYU Tisch (Stella Adler Studio) |
| Reeve Carney | Broadway (Original) | USC (attended) |
| Jordan Dobson | Broadway (Standby) | Temple University |
| John Krause | Broadway (Understudy) | Boston Conservatory at Berklee |
| Jordan Fisher | Broadway | Jacksonville State (attended) |
| Carlos Valdes | Broadway | University of Michigan |
| Ali Louis Bourzgui | Broadway | Ithaca College |
| Jack Wolfe | Broadway | Mountview Academy |
| Joshua Colley | Broadway (Current) | Broadway debut at age 9 (Newsies, Les Mis) |
| Nicholas Barasch | 1st National Tour | Broadway debut at age 10 (West Side Story) |
| Chibueze Ihuoma | 1st National Tour | NYU Tisch |
| J. Antonio Rodriguez | 1st National Tour | University of Oklahoma |
| Bryan Munar | 2nd National Tour | UC Berkeley |
| Ricky Cardenas | 2nd National Tour | Rider University |
| Jose Contreras | 2nd National Tour (Current) | NYU Steinhardt |
NYU (3 Cast Members)
Three NYU graduates have played Orpheus across three different productions. Damon Daunno trained at Tisch’s Stella Adler Studio and originated the role Off-Broadway in 2016. He went on to win a Lucille Lortel Award in 2018 and earn a Tony nomination for Oklahoma! in 2019. Chibueze Ihuoma graduated from Tisch’s New Studio on Broadway in 2021 and was promoted from the Workers Chorus to Orpheus on the first national tour. Jose Contreras, who studied Vocal Performance at NYU Steinhardt, is the current Orpheus on the second national tour.
University of Michigan (2 Cast Members)
The University of Michigan is the only school to have produced both an Orpheus and a Eurydice for Hadestown on Broadway. Carlos Valdes, who earned his BFA in Musical Theatre at Michigan in 2011, went on to become known as Cisco Ramon on The Flash before returning to the stage as Orpheus from January to May 2025. His Broadway debut was actually in Once, and he also toured with Jersey Boys.
Solea Pfeiffer also holds a Michigan BFA and went on to train at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. She played Eurydice from August 2023 to February 2024, bringing credits from Almost Famous on Broadway and as an alternate for Eliza in the Chicago production of Hamilton.
Every School Represented
The remaining college-trained performers come from an impressively wide range of programs, from elite conservatories to state schools to a university better known for computer science than curtain calls. Here is every school represented.
Pace University
Nabiyah Be, who originated the role of Eurydice Off-Broadway in 2016, earned her BFA in Acting from Pace University. She has since won a Drama Desk Award and appeared in the series Daisy Jones & The Six.
Carnegie Mellon University
Lola Tung enrolled in Carnegie Mellon’s School of Drama as a BFA Acting major in fall 2020 but left after her freshman year to film Amazon’s The Summer I Turned Pretty. She returned to Broadway for a five-week limited engagement as Eurydice in February 2024.
University of Southern California
Reeve Carney, the original Broadway Orpheus who played the role for over 1,200 performances across four and a half years, attended USC’s Thornton School of Music for one year. He studied jazz guitar, not musical theatre, before leaving to pursue music full-time.
Boston Conservatory at Berklee
John Krause, a Boston Conservatory graduate, has been with Hadestown since the very first Broadway preview in 2019. One of the longest-serving company members, he understudied Orpheus for years before playing the role as a temporary replacement in September 2025.
Ithaca College
Ali Louis Bourzgui earned his BFA in Musical Theatre at Ithaca College. He broke out as the star of Broadway’s Tommy revival in 2024, earning a Theatre World Award, before taking over as Orpheus from May to August 2025.
University of Oklahoma
J. Antonio Rodriguez earned his BFA at the University of Oklahoma. He joined the first national tour as a swing in 2022 and became the full-time Orpheus in April 2023, playing the role through the tour’s close in May 2024. Rodriguez, a DACA recipient, was the first full-time Latino Orpheus in any Hadestown production.
AMDA College and Conservatory of the Performing Arts
Hailey Kilgore was a first-year student at AMDA when she was cast as Ti Moune in Broadway’s Once on This Island, earning a Tony nomination for Best Actress at just 18. She played Eurydice on Broadway from January to May 2025.
Berklee College of Music
Two Eurydice performers trained at Berklee. Myra Molloy graduated summa cum laude with a major in Singing and Songwriting, completing her degree online while touring with Miss Saigon. She became the first Thai actor to lead a Broadway musical when she took over as Eurydice in May 2025. Maia Reficco attended Berklee’s Young Performers Program on scholarship before playing Eurydice from July 2024 to January 2025.
Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts
Jack Wolfe trained at Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts in London. Known internationally for Netflix’s Shadow and Bone, he made his Broadway debut as Orpheus from September 2025 to March 2026.
Temple University
Jordan Dobson earned a BA in Theater from Temple’s School of Theater, Film and Media Arts. He served as the Broadway company’s Orpheus standby and stepped into the role multiple times, including a confirmed run in January 2022.
Marymount Manhattan College
Jordan Tyson was pursuing a BA in Theatre Arts with a minor in Musical Theatre at Marymount Manhattan before leaving to star in the off-Broadway musical Sweetee. She’s the current Broadway Eurydice, having joined the company in March 2026.
Rider University
Ricky Cardenas earned his BFA in Musical Theatre from Rider University. He joined the second national tour as a swing before being promoted to full-time Orpheus.
Emerson College
Hawa Kamara graduated from Emerson College with a BFA in Musical Theatre in 2023. She is the current Eurydice on the second national tour.
Royal Academy of Dramatic Art
Solea Pfeiffer (Eurydice, Broadway 2023–2024) trained at RADA in London after earning her BFA at the University of Michigan, making her one of the most broadly trained performers to have played either lead role.
Ball State University
Hannah Whitley graduated with a BFA in Musical Theatre from Ball State in spring 2022 and joined the first national tour as Eurydice that same October, playing the role for a full year.
Bradley University
Morgan Siobhan Green, the original Eurydice on the first national tour, earned her BS in Theatre from Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois before completing graduate studies at LIU Post.
Long Island University Post
Morgan Siobhan Green earned her MA in Visual and Performing Arts at LIU Post after Bradley. She originated the role of Eurydice on Hadestown’s first national tour in October 2021 and played it through fall 2022.
Fordham University
Amaya Braganza graduated with a BSW in Social Work from Fordham in 2025, while continuing her performance career. A child actor since age seven, she appeared in the 2012 Broadway revival of Annie and the 2015 revival of The King and I before taking over as Eurydice on the first national tour in October 2023.
University of California, Berkeley
Bryan Munar holds a BA in Computer Science from UC Berkeley. He worked as a software engineer at Mozilla before moving to New York in 2021 to pursue performing. He played Orpheus on the second national tour starting from its October 2024 launch.
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What Does This Tell Us?
A few patterns stand out when you look at the full picture:
- There is no dominant training pipeline. The 30 performers who have played Orpheus and Eurydice come from 20 different schools, and several more trained at performing arts high schools or summer programs rather than traditional college programs. Compare that to The Outsiders, where every single cast member had formal college training.
- The Eurydice role especially favors non-traditional paths. Eva Noblezada left Northwest School of the Arts to star in Miss Saigon on the West End at 17. Lola Tung and Jordan Tyson both left top college programs early for professional opportunities. Megan Colton moved to New York straight out of Arcadia High School and spent three years auditioning before landing the tour.
- Child actors have a real path. Joshua Colley was on Broadway in Newsies and Les Mis as a kid, and most recently appeared in Disney+'s Descendants: The Rise of Red and the upcoming film Brian. Nicholas Barasch made his Broadway debut in West Side Story at age 10. Amaya Braganza appeared in the 2012 revival of Annie and the 2015 revival of The King and I before she was a teenager.
- Career changers are welcome. Bryan Munar studied computer science at Berkeley and worked at Mozilla before pivoting to performing arts. Jordan Fisher booked The Secret Life of the American Teenager and dropped out of Jacksonville State his freshman year to move to LA. You do not need to have known at age 18 that Broadway was your destination.
- University of Michigan keeps showing up. Michigan produced both an Orpheus (Carlos Valdes) and a Eurydice (Solea Pfeiffer) for the Broadway company. The school also has three alumni in The Outsiders. Its BFA Musical Theatre program remains one of the strongest feeders to Broadway.
- NYU leads the Orpheus count. Three of 15 Orpheus performers trained at NYU, spanning three different programs: Tisch's Stella Adler Studio (Damon Daunno, Off-Broadway original), Tisch's New Studio on Broadway (Chibueze Ihuoma, first national tour), and Steinhardt (Jose Contreras, second national tour). The role has literally been passed through NYU alumni across a decade of productions.
If you are a student exploring performing arts programs, this cast is a reminder that the path to Broadway is not one-size-fits-all. Some of these performers earned BFAs from top conservatories. Others went straight from performing arts high schools to the professional stage. What they share is the same stage, eight shows a week, telling the same story.
The schools on your list matter less than the work you do once you commit to a path, whatever that path looks like for you.
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