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Who

One of the most influential casting directors on Broadway, Telsey has launched the careers of dozens of theatrical stars.

Backstory

Bernard Telsey's on-stage career didn't last very long. The Long Island native and NYU grad threw in the towel after just a year, following a stint as Matthew Broderick's understudy in 1983's Brighton Beach Memoirs. Telsey didn't give up on the biz, though: He moved behind the scenes and went to work as an assistant for Simon & Kumin Casting, joining Risa Bramon & Billy Hopkins Casting several years later. Telsey went out on his own in 1988, and spent the first few years handling regional productions and the occasional commercial. His big break came along in 1996 when he was offered the opportunity to cast Jonathan Larson's 1996 off-Broadway musical Rent. Telsey says he wasn't all that impressed when he heard the show's score for the first time, but he stuck with it all the same, trolling rock clubs for undiscovered musical talent and eventually casting Taye Diggs, Idina Menzel, Anthony Rapp, and Jesse L. Martin in the show's principal roles. Rent, of course, turned out to be a monster hit—and Telsey has since gone on to cast some of the most notable theatrical productions in town.

Of note

Telsey is the man to meet if you're interested in launching a showbiz career; his casting decisions have turned more than a few nobodies into overnight stars. Over the past few years, he's cast high-profile musicals such as Wicked, Tarzan, The Color Purple and Legally Blonde; plays such as Glengarry Glen Ross, Wit, Sweeney Todd, Three Days of Rain and Grey Gardens; and he's also worked on a number of films, including Finding Forrester, Peter Hedges' Pieces of April, and the movie version of Rent. The list of actors Telsey has worked with is equally sprawling: It includes Philip Seymour Hoffman, Liev Schreiber, Anna Paquin, Jeremy Piven, Bridget Fonda, Kyra Sedgwick, Benjamin Bratt, Swoosie Kurtz, Marisa Tomei, Fran Drescher, and John Leguizamo, among many others.

Personal

He and his wife Ann live in Midtown West.