Miles Teller Comes Home to His Name in Lights as Hometown Dedicates a Theater
Before Top Gun: Maverick sent his career into overdrive, Miles Teller was a Lecanto High School kid in Central Florida—an athlete and musician who caught the acting bug and began a climb from small-town stage to Hollywood spotlight.
Miles Teller just did the full-circle hometown thing in a way that actually means something. He went back to his Central Florida high school, stepped onto the same stage where he first figured out he could act, and watched it get renamed in his honor. Then he turned the ceremony into a mini masterclass/Q&A/comedy set/PSA, and capped it off with a big donation. Efficient. Very Miles Teller.
What exactly changed (and what didn't)
- Date: December 5, 2025
- Place: Lecanto High School in Lecanto, Florida
- The rename: The stage itself is now the Miles Teller Theater
- Important caveat: The building is still the Curtis Peterson Auditorium. Curtis Peterson served in the Florida Senate and was its president from 1982 to 1984. So the auditorium name stays; the stage within it now carries Teller's name.
- How it went down: Teller came out from behind the curtain to a loud, happy crowd and did a moderated Q&A with students and staff.
- Final flourish: He donated $50,000 to the Citrus County Education Foundation before heading out.
How we got here: Lecanto to Los Angeles, with a drum kit in the middle
Teller grew up in Lecanto and went to Lecanto High, where he split time between sports, music, and drama. He played baseball for the Lecanto Panthers — fun trivia, a photo of him in that uniform flashes at the start of Top Gun: Maverick — and drummed in a band with friends. That drumming did not go to waste; it helped him land the lead in Whiplash later on.
He also got pulled onto the stage as Willard in the school production of Footloose, a role he would reprise a few years later in the 2011 movie remake. The kicker: the high school stage where he played Willard has stayed basically the same for decades. Now it has his name on it.
Q&A highlights: Cruise stories, comedy, and a serious message
Onstage, Teller took questions about making Top Gun: Maverick, what it is like working with Tom Cruise, and what he was like back when he was just another Lecanto student with a packed extracurricular schedule. In between, he cracked jokes and dropped a surprisingly accurate Donald Trump impression.
Then he got real with the teenagers in the room. Teller talked about being ejected from a car in a serious rollover crash years ago and about losing close friends in separate fatal car accidents. His point was simple and pointed: drive safe and drive sober.
The reunion
Teller made a point of crediting Lecanto High's drama program for the spark that sent him to Hollywood, and especially drama teacher Beth Bedee, who noticed his talent early and pushed him to pursue it. Bedee returned to the stage for the ceremony, and Teller reunited with several drama club friends — Joshua Ryan, Michael Selvester, Tim Scholes, and Zach Vlcek among them.
The big picture
Since leaving Lecanto for Los Angeles, Teller has worked alongside some of the biggest names in the business and carved out a reputation as one of the strongest younger leading men working right now. But he clearly hasn't forgotten where it started. A renamed stage, a packed room of students, a useful message, and a $50K check to local education is a pretty tidy way to put a bow on it.
If you want to catch him on screen right now, Teller stars in Eternity, which is currently in theaters.