Broadway Actor and Professor Josh Grisetti Dies at 44
Actor and musical-theatre professor Josh Grisetti died at 44, with friends saying he took his own life on July 10.
Broadway and off-Broadway performer Josh Grisetti died at age 44, friends said on social media. The actor, who had recently stepped away from directing a production of Legally Blonde at Italy’s Trentino Music Festival for personal reasons, is reported to have taken his own life on the morning of July 10.
Grisetti first attracted attention in New York with the York Theatre Company’s 2008 staging of the musical Enter Laughing, earning a Theatre World Award and nominations from the Outer Critics Circle, Drama Desk, Lortel and Drama League. He was initially cast for a Broadway debut as Eugene Jerome in David Cromer’s revival of Neil Simon’s Broadway Bound, but the production was cancelled after low ticket sales for its companion show. His actual Broadway debut came in 2015 as Marty Kaufman in It Shoulda Been You, which brought him an Outer Critics Circle nomination, a Drama Desk nomination and a Clarence Derwent Award. He later appeared as Nigel Bottom in Something Rotten! on Broadway and on tour.
His stage credits also included roles in Peter and the Starcatcher, Rent, Red Eye of Love, Candida and After the Ball, and performances at venues such as the Muny, the Kennedy Center, Goodspeed Musicals and the Williamstown Theatre Festival.
In recent years Grisetti focused on education, serving as associate professor and head of the BFA Musical Theatre program at California State University, Fullerton. He had previously taught at Fullerton College and Loyola Marymount University. He held a BFA in Musical Theatre from the Boston Conservatory and an MFA in Theatre Pedagogy from Loyola Marymount University, after studying drama at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.
Grisetti is survived by his wife, Mackenzie.