Vanessa Hudgens, renowned for her iconic role as Gabriella Montez in Disney’s ‘High School Musical’ franchise, openly acknowledges her late father, Greg Hudgens, as the driving force behind her success. Greg, a dedicated firefighter in San Diego, California, and his family resided near Los Angeles.
Throughout her rise to stardom, Vanessa has consistently emphasized the sacrifices her parents made to support her career. In an interview with Marie Claire, she expressed, ‘My parents gave up so much. He would keep driving back to the same place that he worked every time we moved. By the end, the commute was not fun.’
While Vanessa’s career aspirations took precedence for her parents, they also emphasized the importance of her education. Greg stated in a 2015 interview with The Washington Post, ‘As she got more immersed, we made a pact. As long as she still applied herself to school and kept her head out of the clouds, we would continue to help her.’
Despite Greg’s tireless efforts, Vanessa remains eternally grateful for his unwavering support, acknowledging, ‘I will never be able to repay him with all the time he spent helping me reach my goals.’
Tragically, on January 30, 2016, Greg Hudgens succumbed to a valiant battle with stage 4 cancer. Vanessa announced the devastating news hours before her scheduled performance in Fox’s ‘Grease: Live’ musical special. She shared her grief via X, formerly Twitter, stating, ‘I am so sad to say that last night my daddy, Greg passed away from stage 4 cancer. Thank you to everyone who kept him in your prayers.’
In a separate tweet, she expressed, ‘Tonight, I do the show in his honor.’ Greg’s passing occurred just months after Vanessa publicly disclosed his cancer diagnosis in August 2015. ‘…my dad has just been recently diagnosed with stage 4 cancer,’ she shared. ‘Let me tell you, I hate cancer. I hate cancer with every cell of my being. If you would have asked me two years ago what I thought of cancer, I would have said, ‘Man, you know, it sucks. It’s a horrible disease.’ ‘But that’s only because I had not been faced with it personally.’
Like Greg, Vanessa’s mother, Gina, has been an instrumental force in her rise to stardom. Vanessa credits Gina’s optimism as a source of strength during the challenging time following her father’s passing. ‘She’s so strong through the hardest of times,’ Vanessa told People. ‘But she has this lightheartedness and this light that just beams out of her very being and it’s so special.’
Gina and Greg’s love story began as pen pals. The two exchanged letters while Gina resided in the Philippines and Greg lived in the United States. Greg embarked on a fateful visit to the Philippines, and they soon tied the knot. In 2023, Vanessa revealed her involvement in a family-focused documentary that explores her close bond with her mother and her mother’s upbringing in the Philippines.
‘Growing up there weren’t really that many women who looked like me and my mom and my family on screen,’ Vanessa shared with Glamour UK. ‘As an immigrant, coming into the States and not knowing anyone, I can’t even imagine how difficult and challenging that is and what challenges she faced as a woman. ‘I feel like that’s such a relatable story to so many women all over the world. The more that we can share, the more we can lift each other up.’
