$75 million stage for generosity: Julie Beren Platt and Marc Platt take a star turn in university’s new performing arts center naming

In the realm of American philanthropy, the names of Julie Beren Platt and Marc E. Platt has become synonymous with a quietly powerful commitment to the arts, Jewish life, higher education, and institutional resilience.

Their giving reflects not only generosity in the more traditional sense of large gifts but also a deep engagement with the communities and institutions they support—an approach that elevates infrastructure, culture, security, and opportunity in ways that resonate across generations.

Julie Platt, a 1979 graduate of the University of Pennsylvania (Penn), and Marc Platt, her college sweetheart, have together shaped a philanthropic portfolio that is diverse in its focus and enduring in its impact.

Julie has served on Penn’s Board of Trustees since 2006, rising to the position of vice chair and eventually interim chair during a challenging period in the university’s history.

Meanwhile, Marc, a distinguished film, television, and theater producer, has channeled his professional success into support for performing-arts education and access.

From the vantage point of their philanthropy, two themes stand out: first, a belief that the institutions which shape young adults deserve not only annual support but long-term investment in their environments—and second, a profound sense of communal responsibility, especially within Jewish life and the broader higher-education landscape.

At Penn, their most recent gift garnered headlines when the university announced in November 2025 the naming of the upcoming Platt Student Center for the Performing Arts.

The building, slated to open in early 2027, will provide 38,700 square feet of dedicated space for student performances, rehearsals, and lounging, including a 326-seat theater with a full fly tower and orchestra pit.

This gift is the latest in their long-term support of the arts at the institution: in 2006, they gave a naming gift for the Platt Student Performing Arts House and have supported rehearsal-room space in Houston Hall.

Their giving at Penn also extends to Jewish Studies, endowed scholarships and professorships, the institution’s Hillel chapter, and more—a testament to a holistic engagement with the university as a civic and cultural anchor.

Beyond the campus, Julie Platt’s leadership in Jewish communal life has been equally formidable. From 2022 to 2025, she served as chair of Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA)—the umbrella network of 146 federations across the U.S. and Canada, which distributes more than $3 billion annually.

Under her governance, the organization launched and expanded the “LiveSecure” initiative, designed to build a professional community-security infrastructure for Jewish communal institutions in response to increasing threats of antisemitism.

Since 2018, this campaign has spurred over $750 million invested in Jewish security across North America.

In her own words: “We don’t have the luxury in this moment to be divided… We all do agree that we have to fight antisemitism.”

Within the philanthropic apparatus of the Platt family, the foundations they lead reflect a disciplined yet flexible approach.

The Platt Family Foundation, based in California, supports a range of grants in New York, California, Connecticut, and Washington, D.C., and is governed in part by Julie, Marc, and their children.

Meanwhile, the Julie Beren Platt and Marc E. Platt Foundation, Inc., headquartered in Wichita, Kansas (the Beren family’s home), has deployed general grants, including endowments, in higher education and Jewish communal life.

What distinguishes their philanthropy is neither pure scale nor ostentation, but rather a combination of strategic institution-building, purposeful alignment with mission, and a quiet humility of operation (governance forms show no paid officers and compensation set at zero).

For example, at Penn the Platts chose to invest in a new building not only as a gift of bricks and mortar, but as an enabler of rehearsal, performance, and collaboration—spaces where students can create, experiment, and grow.

In Jewish communal work, their leadership extends beyond writing checks to include convening, organizing, advocating, and providing critical infrastructure during moments of communal urgency—such as in the face of rising antisemitism or the need to rebuild educational and cultural frameworks.

The story of their philanthropy also reflects a generational arc.

Julie, born in Wichita, Kansas, and raised in a family long engaged in Jewish philanthropy (her father, Robert Beren, was noted as an oil-industry magnate and Jewish civic leader), brought to the work both the weight of legacy and the clarity of purpose.

Marc, coming from a production background—film, theater, and television—brings a sensitivity to storytelling, to creative process, and to cultural infrastructure.

Their children, four of whom graduated from Penn, and at least one of whom has established a career in the arts and advocacy (notably their son, Ben Platt), reflect this extended culture of creativity, identity, and philanthropic purpose.

In sum, the philanthropic footprint of the Platt family is both broad and deep: broad in the sense that it spans higher education, arts, Jewish communal security, leadership development, and cultural capital; and deep in the sense that each gift is anchored in institutional partnership, long-term relevance, and community value rather than short-term recognition alone.

A new building at Penn, a national campaign for communal safety, endowed scholarships, and performance spaces—all signal a worldview that recognizes leadership is not a moment but a matrix of space, people, culture, and trust.

For practitioners of philanthropy, the Platts offer a model in which values are expressed, not simply in check-writing, but in governance, in board service, in building enduring platforms—and in standing for the idea that when you invest in artists, students, and communities under pressure, you are investing in society’s long game.

From Wichita to Los Angeles, from campus to synagogue to national federation boardrooms, their imprint is one of sustained generosity, strategic clarity, and communal courage.

In the next decade, as their giving enters the era of next-generation leadership and legacy, the Platt family’s philanthropic architecture offers one of the more compelling blueprints for how private wealth can fuel public good: one in which the building is more than a building, the gift is more than a donation—and the arc of the story bends toward impact, community, and continuity.