Rachel Zegler

Rachel Anne Zegler was born in Hackensack, New Jersey, and grew up in Clifton. Her parents are Gina and Craig Zegler, and she has an older sister named Jacqueline. Her mother was born in the United States to Colombian immigrants and was raised partly in Barranquilla, while her father is of distant Polish descent.

Zegler became interested in theater after seeing Beauty and the Beast on Broadway at age four. Her first acting role came at age 12, when she played Shprintze in a local production of Fiddler on the Roof. She subsequently took voice and acting lessons.

At Immaculate Conception High School, she played Belle in Beauty and the Beast, Ariel in The Little Mermaid, Dorothy Brock in 42nd Street, and Princess Fiona in Shrek the Musical. She received Metropolitan High School Theater Award nominations for all four performances and graduated as salutatorian in 2019. She also built an online audience through singing videos on her YouTube channel.

In 2018, Steven Spielberg invited Hispanic performers between the ages of 15 and 25 to respond to an open casting call for his film adaptation of West Side Story. Zegler, then 16, submitted videos of herself singing “Tonight” and “I Feel Pretty.” She was selected from more than 30,000 applicants to play María, making the film her professional screen debut.

The film was released in 2021 and received acclaim for its performances, including Zegler's portrayal of María. She won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy, becoming the first actress of Colombian descent to win the category and, at age 20, its youngest winner.

Zegler's performance also earned nominations from the Critics' Choice Movie Awards and several critics' groups. She appeared opposite Ansel Elgort, who played Tony, and met actor Josh Andrés Rivera during production. Zegler and Rivera later appeared together in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes.

Zegler played Anthea in the superhero film Shazam! Fury of the Gods, released in 2023. She followed it with the role of Lucy Gray Baird in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, a prequel to The Hunger Games series. Critics particularly praised her ability to combine acting and singing in the role.

For The Hunger Games production, Zegler adapted her singing voice to maintain Lucy Gray's Appalachian accent while performing songs live during filming. Her soundtrack performances included “The Hanging Tree,” “The Ballad of Lucy Gray Baird,” and “Nothing You Can Take from Me.”

Her later screen work included Laura in Y2K, Princess Ellian in the animated musical Spellbound, and the title role in Disney's live-action Snow White. She also voiced María del Carmen and Gloria Calderón in the podcast series Princess of South Beach.

Zegler made her Broadway debut as Juliet Capulet in the musical adaptation Romeo + Juliet, directed by Sam Gold with music by Jack Antonoff. The production ran at Circle in the Square Theatre from September 2024 through February 2025, and Zegler won an iHeartRadio Music Award for Favorite Broadway Debut.

She made her West End debut as Eva Perón in Jamie Lloyd's revival of Evita at the London Palladium in 2025. Her performance received positive reviews and earned the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Musical, along with other theater honors.

Zegler later played Cathy Hiatt in concert productions of The Last Five Years with Ben Platt at the Hollywood Bowl and Radio City Music Hall. Her recorded work includes cast and soundtrack performances from West Side Story, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, Spellbound, Snow White, Evita, and The Last Five Years.

Zegler and actor Josh Andrés Rivera confirmed their relationship in February 2021 after meeting on the set of West Side Story. Their relationship ended in 2024.

Zegler has identified Barbra Streisand as one of her primary artistic influences. Streisand sent her a copy of the album Release Me 2 and the book Streisand from A to Z in 2021.