Conrad Ricamora Launches Scholarship Fund “The Right to Be There” for Asian American Male Actors

A recent casting controversy surrounding the Broadway musical Maybe Happy Ending has inspired Tony-nominated actor Conrad Ricamora to start a scholarship fund for budding Asian American male actors, as told by The Hollywood Reporter. The scholarship, called The Right to Be There, was announced shortly after it was revealed that Andrew Barth Feldman, who is white, would be taking over the role of Oliver, a character originally played by Darren Criss, who is of Filipino descent. Criss was recognized as the first actor of Asian descent to win a Tony Award for Lead Actor in a Musical earlier this year. The casting decision felt like a painful reversal to many in the AAPI theater community.

Ricamora, known for his acclaimed performances in Here Lies Love, Soft Power, Oh, Mary!, and How to Get Away with Murder, expressed his frustration in a public statement, noting that “there’s a lot of pain right now. Pain from being told subtly and explicitly that we don’t belong. Pain from watching history repeat itself.” His goal with the scholarship is to affirm the presence and value of Asian American men in the acting world, on stage and in training programs alike. “No young actor should grow up feeling like their presence is conditional,” he wrote. “Not in their training, and not on the stage.”

To back up his words with action, Ricamora seeded the GoFundMe campaign with $8,000 of his own money, a nod to the number eight’s significance as a lucky number in Chinese culture. and pledged to match up to $10,000 in public donations. In just a few days, the campaign had raised $34,000, with contributions continuing to pour in. As of this writing, the total raised had exceeded $40,000.

The fund is available to Asian American men enrolled or accepted into accredited BFA or MFA acting programs. Ricamora said he hopes the scholarship will help counteract the systemic underrepresentation of Asian men in leading roles across American theater. While shows like Here Lies Love and KPOP have highlighted AAPI performers, Ricamora and his peers argue that casting decisions like the one in Maybe Happy Ending demonstrate that these moments are still treated as exceptions, not the norm.

The fund has been praised in the theater community as a step toward change. Actor Jose Llana, Ricamora’s Here Lies Love co-star, shared in the frustration when he noted how often Asian men are not considered for roles, even when characters are written as Asian. Ricamora’s scholarship isn’t just a reaction to a single casting decision. It’s a long-term investment in a more equitable future for Asian American representation onstage.

Photo by Maybe Happy Ending.