Tony Yazbeck Joins AMERICAN SPORTS STORY With Lindsay Mendez & Josh Andrés Rivera

Tony Yazbeck has joined Ryan Murphy’s latest FX anthology American Sports Story.

Deadline reports that Yazbeck will play a key recurring role opposite the previously reported Lindsay Mendez, Josh Andrés Rivera, and Patrick Schwarzenegger.

The series follows Aaron Hernandez's journey from being the New England Patriots tight end to a convicted murderer who took his own life. The series will examine his legacy and where it stands in the culture of American sports.

Yazbeck will play Urban Meyer, the head coach of the University of Florida, whose desire to win football games overcome the promises he makes to the students that play for him. 

Rivera, who appeared in the West Side Story film and national tour of Hamilton, will play Aaron Hernandez. Mendez will play Tanya Singleton, Aaron Hernandez’s cousin and pseudo-mother figure, with Schwarzenegger as Tim Tebow.

About Tony Yazbeck

Yazbeck is a Tony Award-nominated actor and director who has directed many collaborative theatrical concerts for the YoungArts Foundation, most recently at The Kennedy Center. He will be directing Stephen Schwartz’s Children of Eden at David Geffen Hall (Lincoln Center) on February 18, 2024.

He has been an associate of Bill T. Jones, Tina Landau, and has collaborated with many other award-winning directors. As an actor, he most recently starred as Cary Grant in the new musical Flying Over Sunset on Broadway at Lincoln Center Theatre. He began his career at the age of 11 on Broadway in Gypsy with Tyne Daly.

For the 2014 Broadway revival of On the Town, he won the Astaire Award. He was nominated for the Tony, Drama League, and Outer Critics Circle awards for his virtuosic performance. He also starred in the Susan Stroman/Harold Prince–helmed Japan and Broadway productions of Prince of Broadway, for which he received the Chita Rivera Award as well as Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Award nominations. 

His other Broadway credits include Finding Neverland (J.M. Barrie), Chicago (Billy Flynn), Irving Berlin’s White Christmas (Phil Davis), Gypsy with Patti LuPone (Tulsa; Outer Critics Circle nomination), A Chorus Line (Al), Oklahoma!, and Never Gonna Dance. Off-Broadway credits include A Chorus Line (City Center), The Cradle Will Rock (Classic Stage), The Beast in the Jungle (Vineyard Theatre), The Scarlet Pimpernel and Crazy For You (both at David Geffen Hall), Fanny Hill (York Theatre), and for New York City Center Encores! he has appeared in Little Me, On the Town, Gypsy, The Apple Tree, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, and Pardon My English.