(© Jerry Avenaim)
Ben Foster, best known for playing cold-blooded murderer Charlie Prince in the 2007 film western 3:10 to Yuma, will join Emmy winner and Tony Award nominee Alec Baldwin (30 Rock) and British actor Tom Sturridge (On the Road) in the upcoming Broadway production of Lyle Kessler's Orphans. He replaces Transformers star Shia LaBeouf, who departed the production on February 20 due to "creative differences."
While Foster, whose many screen credits include Hostage, X-Men: The Last Stand, Alpha Dog, and 22-episodes of the HBO drama Six Feet Under, makes his professional stage debut in the production, he's no stranger to the world of theater. He first caught the acting bug in a community theater production of You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, and later attended the prestigious Interlochen Theater Arts Summer Program, according to IMDb. A Daytime Emmy winner for his role in the film adaptation of the play Bang Bang You're Dead, Foster is set to appear in the film version of Adam Rapp's acclaimed play Red Light Winter.
Foster will begin rehearsals on February 22 for the role of Treat, an orphaned brother who supports his younger, simple-minded sibling Phillip (Sturridge) by petty theft. Directed by Tony Award winner Daniel Sullivan (Glengarry Glen Ross), Orphans will begin previews on March 19 at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, with an opening set for April 7. The drama, which stars Baldwin as Harold, a wealthy older man kidnapped by the two brothers, is produced by Frederick Zollo and Robert Cole.
Orphans had its premiere in 1983 at Los Angeles' Matrix Theatre and was later produced in New York by the Steppenwolf Theatre Company at the Westside Arts Theatre.
