Ramin Karimloo and Anoushka Lucas to star in A Face in the Crowd at the Young Vic

Readers may recall that the Almeida Theatre recently staged Cold War, Conor McPherson’s version of the 2018 film by Paweł Pawlikowski, which featured music by Elvis Costello (see our review in Issue 7). This autumn, there’ll be another film-to-stage adaptation featuring original songs by Costello: two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Sarah Ruhl’s adaptation of Elia Kazan’s 1957 satirical cautionary tale A Face in the Crowd, staged at the Young Vic, London from 10 September – 9 November.

Ramin Karimloo and Anoushka Lucas play the lead roles of drifter Larry 'Lonesome' Rhodes and radio producer Marcia Jeffries (played in the film by Andy Griffith and Patricia Neal). A West End and Broadway leading man, Karimloo is perhaps best-known for playing Jean Valjean in Les Misérables (Tony nomination) and The Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera and Love Never Dies. This February, he starred in The Addams Family at the London Palladium and, in March, made his operatic debut in Songbird with Washington National Opera. He’ll shortly appear in Titanic with New York City Center’s Encores!.

Lucas, Musicals’ first Rising Star, was Olivier-nominated for her performance as Laurey in Daniel Fish’s production of Oklahoma! at the Young Vic. Most recently, Lucas performed her self-penned one-woman show Elephant at the Bush Theatre and starred in The Crucible at the Sheffield Crucible.

The show marks Kwame Kwei-Armah’s final production as Young Vic Artistic Director. Under his tenure, the Young Vic’s Musical Theatre productions have included Fun Home, Oklahoma!, Mandela and the upcoming Passing Strange (see our review in the August/September issue of Musicals).

For more information and tickets, visit youngvic.org