Idris Elba with Kwame Kwei-Armah, artistic Director of the Young Vic Theatre. Picture: David Sandison
Screen star Idris Elba will join forces with award-winning director and playwright Kwame Kwei-Armah to create a major new musical which will premiere at the Young Vic next summer.
Already tipped as one of the highlights of Kwei-Armah’s second year as artistic director of the Young Vic, Tree is inspired by Elba’s album ‘Mi Mandela’ which will provide the soundtrack for the story of one young man’s journey in ‘search for the soul and spirit’ of contemporary South Africa.
Kwei-Armah will also direct the production which will be performed in the round in the Main House from 29 July until 24 August with a press night on 1 August.
Co-produced by the Young Vic, Manchester International Festival and Green Door Pictures, the creative team also includes set and costume designer Jon Bausor, sound designer Paul Arditti, video designer Duncan McLean, music supervisor and composer Michael ‘Mikey J’ Asante, and choreographer Gregory Maqoma, with casting by Pippa Ailion, CDG.
Tree is part of a 2019 season that also includes Company’s Marianne Elliott taking a break from musical theatre to direct an eagerly-anticipated version of Arthur Miller’s class play Death of a Salesman starring Elba’s co-star from the cult crime series The Wire, Wendell Pierce. Pierce will play Willy Loman alongside Sharon D Clarke and Arinzé Kene.
Announcing the full line-up of productions, Kwei-Armah said: “The stages of The Young Vic have always been a place dedicated to asking the most profound questions in artistically compelling ways. It’s not just the art we invite into these four walls but also the art and discourse we send beyond them.
“In 2019 we will see Marianne Elliott dance with Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesmen; Idris Elba and I’s funky multi-disciplinary Tree; Yaël Farber and Marina Carr’s transformation of Lorca’s Blood Wedding; Jackie Sibblies Drury’s fierce and challenging new work Fairview directed by Nadia Latif; and the exquisite pain of Okwui Okpokwasili’s Bronx Gothic.”
Kwei-Armah, the former Casualty actor and acclaimed playwright who arrived at the Young Vic following an acclaimed and award-winning run as artistic director of Baltimore Center Stage, succeeded David Lan who stepped down this year after 18 years at the helm of the Young Vic.
Angela Thomas
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