Kenny Ortega Addresses Rumor Zac Efron Didn’t Sing In ‘High School Musical’

Although Zac Efron is recognized for his roles in several popular films, including “Charlie St. Cloud,” “17 Again,” and “Neighbors,” many first came to know the 37-year-old from his time playing Troy Bolton in the Disney franchise “High School Musical.”

In the film, Efron plays high school jock Troy Bolton, the star player of the East High Wildcats basketball team, who finds himself torn between his role as the team’s star player and his lead role in the school’s drama production.

The movie is jam-packed with iconic choreography, unbelievable one-liners, and popular songs—many of which feature Zac Efron’s character. However, for years, fans didn’t know a key secret: some of Troy Bolton’s vocals were actually performed by another actor, Drew Seeley.

In an interview with Entertainment Tonight, “High School Musical” director Kenny Ortega explained why they had another actor singing some of Efron’s music.

“The songs were written before Zac got the role,” Ortega said. “So although he could sing, and he had a lovely voice, it wasn’t the voice that the songs were written for. So he sang everything and we dubbed parts of it, so that it had greater vocal strength.”

Seeley eventually replaced Efron during the “High School Musical” tour in 2006 and 2007 while the latter was filming the “Hairspray” remake.

During a previous interview, he also opened up about filling in for Efron on the official soundtrack, saying, “I was never told why they did it the way that they did it.”

“But I think that they were within about three, four weeks of shooting the actual film, and they had me and not Zac. Me and the rest of the movie cast all go into the studio for, like, four days straight and record all the songs together. So, yeah, I knew that I was doing that,” he said.

And while on tour, Seeley shared that he “hit it off” with the rest of the cast, despite not actually being seen in the movie.

He did joke, however, “I do think Vanessa resented it a little bit when I was on tour because she was like, ‘I wanna sing to my boyfriend every night, not this guy.’”

“High School Musical” premiered on Disney Channel in January 2006, drawing over seven million live viewers and breaking the then-record for the highest premiere on the network.

In addition to Efron and Hudgens, who played the film’s protagonists, the cast featured other all-star performers, including Ashley Tisdale, Corbin Bleu, and Lucas Grabeel.

The film’s soundtrack was a massive commercial success, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and ultimately spawning two sequels and the Disney+ TV series, “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.”

Years later, Efron spoke with Vanity Fair about his time on set and reflected on the exact moment he knew the movie would be a big deal.

“Not many people know this, but High School Musical was just a made-for-TV movie and it was very small, so we had a very condensed shooting schedule and very limited rehearsal time,” Efron shared before speaking about the rehearsal process for the iconic “Getcha Head In The Game” scene.

“I think we might’ve practiced it for two days prior to doing that all in sync,” Efron said. “We maybe had two three-hour rehearsals with basketballs. After five takes, we nailed it.”