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American actor Zac Efron was born as Zachary David Alexander Efron on October 18th, 1987, in San Luis Obispo, California. Growing up in a middle class setting, Zac started acting in theater plays during his high school years, and also took up singing lessons. He graduated in 2006 and later attended the Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts, a theater company in Santa Monica, California.

Zac’s early acting gigs can be traced back to the beginning of the 2000s, when he appeared in TV shows such as Firefly, ER and Miracle Run. He got his first main role when he was cast in the drama series Summerland, which ran from 2004 to 2005. Efron debuted on the big screen in 2003’s film adaptation Melinda’s World. His breakout role came, however, when he was cast as the male lead in Disney’s High School Musical (2006,) a film that was an immediate success and propelled him and his castmates into stardom, particularly amongst teenage audiences. He reprised his role for the two subsequent movies, released in 2007 and 2008. The third installment of the High School Musical series was the only one to receive a theatrical release, as the previous two premiered on television only.

In between HSM, Zac appeared in another musical movie, this time the film adaptation of popular Broadway show, Hairspray (2007,) becoming a commercial success. He later starred in comedy 17 Again (2009,) which was also a big box office success. Efron turned to drama roles when he appeared in 2008’s period drama Me and Orson Wells, as well as supernatural romantic drama Charlie St Cloud (2010.) Other notable film appearances of this decade were in New Year’s Eve (2011,) The Lucky One (2012,) Liberal Arts (2012,) The Paperboy (2012,) and Neighbors (2014.)

During the latter half of the 2010s, Efron starred in a series of comedy and romantic movies, such as Dirty Grandpa (2016,) Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates (2016,) and Baywatch (2017.) He returned to the musical scene when he starred in The Greatest Showman (2017,) which was a critical and commercial hit. Efron appeared as serial killer Ted Bundy in Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile in 2019. The following year, he lent his voice to the Scooby-Doo animated film, Scoob!. In 2021, his Netflix web documentary series Down to Earth with Zac Efron won a Daytime Emmy Award. In 2022, Zac had two main film roles, in survival thriller Gold and in horror movie Firestarter. Aside from his ongoing web documentary, he is set to star in comedy The Greatest Beer Run Ever and The Iron Claw.

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