Jonathan Groff opened the 2026 TIME100 Gala in New York City on 23 April with a performance that stopped conversation at every table. The Glee and Hamilton star — honoured this year for championing LGBTQ+ representation across mainstream television, theatre, and streaming — did not perform a Broadway showstopper. He performed an original composition written specifically for the evening, according to a guest who attended. Within hours, a clip captured by three separate attendees had reached 4.2 million views on X before the formal programme had concluded.
The annual gala, held every spring since 2005, celebrates TIME magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world — an exercise in soft power that places technology executives, heads of state, artists, and athletes in the same room once a year and invites them to have dinner. The 2026 edition brought more than 400 guests to a venue in midtown Manhattan for a sold-out evening whose charitable proceeds benefit educational programmes in 14 countries. Among the honorees present were Hilary Duff with her husband Matthew Koma; Victoria Beckham; Kate Hudson; tennis legend Maria Sharapova; journalist and media executive Gayle King; musician Wyclef Jean; and Colman Domingo, who arrived hours before his lead performance in Antoine Fuqua's Michael Jackson biopic opens in US theaters on 24 April.
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