Theater News

Michael Ball and Faith Prince Set for ENO’s Kismet

Michael Ball
(© Joseph Marzullo/Retna)
Michael Ball
(© Joseph Marzullo/Retna)

Michael Ball and Faith Prince will play the leading roles of Hajj and Lalume in the English National Opera’s staging of Kismet, June 25-July 14 at the London Coliseum. The musical will be directed by Gary Griffin, who conceived the production with Luther Davis and Kit Hesketh-Harvey.

The 130-person company — including cast and orchestra — will feature Donald Maxwell (Imam), Sarah Tynan (Marsinah), Alfie Boe (the Caliph), Julian Curry (Jawan), Graeme Danby (Wazir), and Rodney Clark (Chief of Police). The show will be choreographed by Javier de Frutos. Griffin is the director of The Color Purple and is best known in London for his work on the Donmar Warehouse production of Pacific Overtures.

Kismet, which has a book by Charles Lederer and music and lyrics by Robert Wright and George Forrest, follows the remarkable changes of fortune that engulf a poor poet during the course of one incredible day. The show premiered on Broadway in 1953 and opened in London in 1955. A 1955 film version, directed by Vincente Minnelli, starred Howard Keel and Dolores Gray.

Ball is one of England’s biggest musical theater stars; his many credits include Aspects of Love and The Woman in White. Prince won the 1992 Tony Award for her portrayal of Miss Adelaide in Guys & Dolls, and received Tony nominations for Bells Are Ringing and Jerome Robbins’ Broadway.

For more information, visit www.whatonstage.com.

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Kismet

Closed: July 14, 2007