Well, it’s time to feel old again. Twenty years ago, when my daughters were 9 and 8, a made-for-TV movie quietly premiered on the Disney Channel and ended up rewriting the rules for youth entertainment. When High School Musical debuted on January 20, 2006, few could have predicted it would evolve into a global franchise, a hit-making machine, and the blueprint for music-driven storytelling that still shapes Disney’s strategy today.
Directed by Kenny Ortega, the film introduced audiences to East High and a cast of then-unknowns led by Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens, alongside Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel, Corbin Bleu, and Monique Coleman. What followed exceeded all expectations.
If you don’t remember, On New Year’s Eve, high school juniors Troy Bolton and Gabriella Montez meet while vacationing at a Utah ski lodge, where they’re unexpectedly paired for a karaoke duet. The connection lingers after they return home, and by coincidence, Gabriella transfers to Troy’s school, East High, where he’s the star basketball captain.
When drama club diva Sharpay Evans mistakes Gabriella for a musical rival, a chain reaction begins. Troy and Gabriella secretly audition for the school musical, discovering a shared love of singing that challenges their carefully curated social identities. Their growing bond rattles both the basketball team and the academic decathlon squad, who fear losing focus — and status.
Pressure from friends and rivals leads to a painful misunderstanding that briefly drives Troy and Gabriella apart. But after the truth comes out, they reunite, determined to follow their passions. Sharpay makes one last attempt to sabotage them by scheduling the musical callbacks at the same time as Troy’s championship game and Gabriella’s decathlon finals.
With help from their classmates, Troy and Gabriella race between events, ultimately arriving just in time to audition. Their performance earns them the lead roles, while both the basketball and decathlon teams claim victory. The film closes with East High celebrating unity, individuality, and the idea that you don’t have to choose just one path.
The franchise continued with the meta mockumentary comedy High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, which premiered on Disney+ at launch in 2019.
Created and executive produced by Tim Federle, it introduced a new generation of megastars: Olivia Rodrigo as Nini Salazar-Roberts, Joshua Bassett as Ricky Bowen, Matt Cornett as E.J. Caswell, Sofia Wylie as Gina Porter, Larry Saperstein as Big Red, Julia Lester as Ashlyn Caswell, Dara Reneé as Kourtney Greene, Frankie Rodriguez as Carlos Rodriguez, and Joe Serafini as Seb Matthew-Smith. Stars from the original films — Bleu, Coleman, Grabeel, Bart Johnson, Alyson Reed, and Kaycee Stroh — also made cameos throughout the series’ four seasons.
Twenty years later, High School Musical remains one of Disney Channel’s most popular franchises — one that continues to attract generations of new viewers, with more than 1.2 billion lifetime hours across streaming and linear.
All three films continue to rank among the top Disney Channel Original Movies on Disney+ in 2025, globally and domestically. But the numbers only tell part of the story, as High School Musical helped establish Disney’s music-driven model, powering hit franchises such as Descendants (nearly 1 billion hours viewed to date across streaming and linear), as well as Camp Rock and ZOMBIES.
But numbers alone don’t explain the staying power.
According to Charlie Andrews, EVP of Live Action at Disney Branded Television, the success came down to a rare alignment of talent, timing, and emotional honesty. The team behind the film understood how to cast performers who felt authentic and relatable, grounding the story in universal teenage experiences — identity, friendship, and the push-pull between who you are and who others expect you to be. Add music that captured the spirit of the moment, and the result became bigger than the movie itself.
Steven Vincent, SVP of Music and Soundtracks, points to the emotional accessibility of the songs as the key to the film’s global reach. What surprised Disney internally was how seamlessly the story translated across cultures. Teenagers in Japan, India, Germany, and the U.S. responded the same way because the core question was universal: figuring out where you fit and how to express yourself.
The soundtrack played a crucial role in that connection. Rather than leaning into a single musical style, the film blended contemporary pop with Broadway-inspired numbers and piano-driven ballads. Each genre reflected a different character perspective, mainstream pop for Troy and Gabriella, theatrical showpieces for Sharpay and Ryan, and a unifying anthem that brought everyone together. That closing number, built around collective belonging, proved timeless and continues to resonate two decades later.
Twenty years later, High School Musical remains one of Disney’s most-watched titles across streaming and linear platforms. But its true legacy lies in how it changed the business. It proved that music-driven storytelling could launch global stars, sustain multi-platform franchises, and create emotional connections strong enough to last decades.
What began as a Disney Channel experiment ultimately became a blueprint, one that continues to shape how entertainment companies build franchises in a world where music, story, and identity travel faster than ever.
Even though we’re all 20 years older, we’re still in this together.
The Geek is a working screenwriter, director and screenwriting instructor.
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