The London home of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Matilda The Musical will be the setting for a special livestreamed event celebrating World Book Day’s 25th birthday.
Hosted by rapper MC Grammar, World Book Day Live with Matilda and friends on 28 February at the Cambridge Theatre will showcase authors and illustrators including two Children’s Laureates, Cressida Cowell and Chris Riddell, along with Greg James, Chris Smith, Frank Cottrell-Boyce, Humza Arshad, Allen Fatimaharan and Hannah Lee.
World Book Day Live with Matilda and friends will also feature two new talents from World Book Day’s #PassThePen initiative with BookTrust – Nirzrana Farook and Maisie Chan. The event will also include live drawing by Chris Riddell.
Presented by long-term partners the Roald Dahl Story Company, the RSC and Puffin, access to World Book Day Live with Matilda and friends will also include an extract from Roald Dahl’s classic book Matilda, read by a member of the cast of Matilda The Musical.
Classrooms and homes across the UK will be able to access the livestream from 11am via WorldBookDay.com.
The 25th birthday celebrations will begin with a special performance of the multi-award-winning musical. Now booking through to 18 December, Matilda The Musical is the longest-running production to grace the stage at the Cambridge Theatre.
Written by playwright Dennis Kelly, with music and lyrics by comedian, musician and composer Tim Minchin, Matilda The Musical is directed and developed by Matthew Warchus. The crowd-pleasing production which celebrated 10 years in London in 2021 boasts design by Rob Howell, with choreography by Peter Darling, orchestrations, additional music and musical supervision by Christopher Nightingale, lighting by Hugh Vanstone, sound by Simon Baker and the special effects and illusions are by Paul Kieve.
The musical version of Roald Dahl’s much-loved creation is produced in the West End by executive producers Denise Wood and Griselda Yorke for the Royal Shakespeare Company. The production was developed with the support of Jeanie O’Hare and the RSC Literary Department.
Matilda The Musical was commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company and premiered at the RSC’s Courtyard Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon in November 2010, before transferring to London’s West End in October 2011, where it opened to rave reviews. It is the winner of 99 major international awards, including a record-breaking seven Olivier Awards and a total of 24 for Best Musical.
Productions have toured the UK and Ireland, South Africa, North America, Australia, New Zealand and China. The musical’s first non-English language production played Seoul in South Korea in 2018/2019.
A film version with the same core creative team is set for release exclusively in cinemas across the UK and Ireland on 2 December followed by a worldwide release by Netflix.
Produced by Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner of Working Title, Jon Finn, and Luke Kelly of The Roald Dahl Story Company, Sony Pictures/TriStar Pictures will release the film theatrically in the UK while Netflix will release the film in the rest of the world.
Angela Thomas
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