Welcome to Playbill Pride, your resource for all LGBTQIA+ theatre news and resources.

Every June, Playbill celebrates Pride month in a very special manner: by turning our iconic yellow Playbill logo into every color of the rainbow, in support of the LGBTQIA+ community. We first launched these special covers in June 2014 and over the years, they’ve even acquired their own special nickname: Pridebills.

Playbill Pride and the Pridebills first launched in 2014. As Playbill CEO and President Philip S. Birsh said at the time: “The Broadway community has always been on the forefront of this issue—leading the way to prove that equality, love and respect matters. Playbill continues its support for this vital cause by honoring all the outstanding efforts made by the community at large and will lend our magazine—the magazine of Broadway—to celebrate all the theatrical community has done to further the efforts towards fairness and equality.” It wasn’t just a cosmetic show of support—Playbill has been a large supporter of the charity organization Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS since its inception.

The person who designed the Playbill Pride logo was Robbie Rozelle. He explained how he landed upon the rainbow design: “When creating the original art for Playbill Pride, I went through various incarnations. I knew it had to stand out, but also work with black text on top of it, with Playbill’s name and theatre name legible. We played around with options of changing the coloring of Playbill’s name, and we had one that I loved that had the rainbow flag flying behind, but I worried about things being readable. That’s when I decided to just go to the basics of Gilbert Baker’s rainbow flag. I remember getting on the train after shows and seeing people holding their Playbills and beaming, knowing that I was part of something so significant to my people.”