How JJ Niemann Became Both Broadway Actor and Viral TikTok Star: ‘There Is Power in Myself’ (Exclusive)

JJ Niemann's secret to success is authenticity. The social media content creator and Broadway actor has spent the last three years cultivating an online presence that has garnered over 1 million followers and more than 94 million likes between his TikTok and Instagram accounts, and that's not the full extent of his engagement. 

Niemann's niche is the theater community, but it's not exclusive to professional performers. His videos, which often see him singing popular show tunes and wearing realistic, over-the-top imitations of theater costumes (colorful wigs, a phone charger repurposed to look like a microphone, etc.), are relatable to essentially anyone who has ever participated in a school play. 

"Comedy and relatability is in specificity. And the weird thing is that you think it's so niche and so specific that no one can relate, or there's so few people, but that specificity unlocks core memories for people," Niemann exclusively tells The Messenger.

The community of professional actors in New York City is ultimately quite small, he says. However, he adds, "Almost everyone has experienced, at some point, theater."

The 28-year-old North Carolina native is an original cast member in Broadway's Back To The Future: The Musical where, in addition to portraying various ensemble characters, he understudies the leading roles of Marty McFly and his father, George (originated in the 1985 film by Michael J. Fox and Crispin Glover, respectively). 

Niemann began pursuing a life in show business following his college career as a musical theater student at Elon University. After graduation, he was cast in Broadway's hit musical comedy The Book of Mormon. 

The actor performed on and off as a swing (a member of the cast who understudies multiple roles, usually in the ensemble) for four years and took a leave from the show when the COVID-19 pandemic darkened the entire theater district for over a year.

When it became abundantly clear that his livelihood had been placed on an indefinite pause, Niemann eventually made his way back to North Carolina to stay with his family. 

"While I was there, I cleaned up my childhood bedroom and found all these old wigs and stuff that my sisters had gotten me over the years because I used to create YouTube videos as a kid," Niemann recalls. "I stopped doing it because I got busy with theater and because, like... cyberbullying. And that's scary as a teenager when you don't know who you are, you're closeted, you can't handle those kinds of comments."

After he downloaded TikTok in 2020, though, he rekindled his passion for filming and editing. He started cautiously, lip-syncing to different audio tracks as to not put his real voice on the public forum, but then he realized just how vast a theater community existed on the app. 

Since he published content in which he acted out some of the backstage, behind-the-scenes experiences that so many connect with — especially during a time when performing really wasn't an option — Niemann was reminded why he had always loved theater: because of those little moments. 

His hope was that these short videos would bring theater fans back to the first time they found a pure, unadulterated love of the art. Still, he never expected his reach to grow as far as it has. 

"If I'm able to pull back the curtain a little bit and demystify Broadway a little bit — because Broadway seems so elitist and, like, untouchable and so far away... When I was a kid, it felt not even possible," Niemann admits. "So to have actors on TikTok — and there's so many others now doing it, too — it's like, 'Oh my god, they're just like me'; 'Oh, they had a hard day just like me'; 'Oh, they goof around backstage just like me,' it's really special." 

Producing social media content while simultaneously performing on Broadway can be tricky to navigate in both a professional and social environment. In any entertainment industry, it might seem that having a social media presence would have some positive impact on an actor's ability to secure jobs, but Niemann says, in his experience, this is not the case. 

He's found that casting professionals typically don't care about his social media platform; still, that doesn't mean his online presence has gone unnoticed. 

For his peers familiar with his content, Niemann reveals he has often met people with preconceived notions about his personality, something he finds "really weird."

"Sometimes I'm in casts with people [who] will straight up tell me later on, weeks down the line or towards the end of the contract, 'Yeah, I didn't think I would like you,'" Niemann says. "People just make all these assumptions that you're gonna be mean, you're gonna be narcissistic, you're gonna be self-serving, you're gonna be annoying, making content all the time, you're not gonna be focused on your job.

"But my favorite thing is always proving people wrong. My favorite thing is being like, 'No, I'm actually a very kind person, I'm very hard working. My work and my job will always come first, and then I also make content.'"

Niemann must also remain mindful of the fact that he is under a contract, and he has to sometimes remove or refrain from posting anything that producers aren't comfortable with — even when it comes to showing off a certain costume or having phones behind the stage curtains.

That is pretty much the extent of his limitations. Through the course of his journey, he has continued to find out that the sky is the limit. 

As someone who has admittedly built a career performing in the background, Niemann says he has spent many years placing limits on himself, even convincing himself that being an ensemble member was his destiny because, while he enjoyed it, it was also the only thing he was capable of. 

"Once I started making content online, I realized that there is power in myself and my energy and my personality," Niemann proclaims, adding that he finally came to the realization that "people are drawn to me and my energy and who I am and my humor and my essence. That is star quality. That is star power. And it can be as simple as that."

Delusion, he says, can be a positive state of mind when it means relentlessly believing in oneself.

"There's power in who I am. And bringing JJ into the audition room is going to get me these jobs," Niemann reminds himself. 

He never had any doubt he would go on to play Marty McFly (normally played on Broadway by Casey Likes). Throughout the numerous rounds of auditions, Niemann says, he remained steady in the belief that every facet of the role was meant for him. 

The incredibly upbeat and lively musical is Niemann's home for the foreseeable future (the musical's run is currently open-ended), which he is thrilled about since this is, as he puts it, "genuinely the most fun I've ever had with a cast in a show in my life."

The musical adaptation of the cult classic '80s film is also expanding beyond Broadway, with a production still running in the West End and a North American tour planned to begin next year, so Niemann is excited to see what the future holds. 

Just a few nights into the show's Broadway run, Niemann was called upon at the eleventh hour to go on for Marty in front of an audience that consisted of the blockbuster film's co-creator Bob Gale, legendary musicians Alan Silvestri and Glen Ballard and more of the show's creators who, Niemann says, praised his performance. 

"They got to see me do it with three hours notice and not having rehearsed half the show, and [not] just do it — not to toot my own horn — but like nail it, like word perfect," Niemann proudly remembers. "That is something that I will never forget. If I can do that, I can literally do everything. I just led a Broadway show."

Niemann only looks to move up from where he is now. "I'm planning on bringing that knowledge, and what I've gleaned, and my own power that I've gained from social media and all that energy into the next thing," he says. "Hopefully I get to create something myself — that will be beautiful to create something from scratch — and I'm excited to do that. I'm really excited."