Los Angeles’ East West Players and the Japanese American Cultural & Community Center have announced that George Takei will lead the cast of the L.A. premiere of the Broadway musical Allegiance. Takei will return to the roles of Sam Kimura and Ojii-Chan, which marked the actor’s Broadway debut in 2015.
The production is co-produced by EWP and JACCC by special arrangement with Sing Out, Louise! Productions and ATA, with a run scheduled for February 21-April 1, 2018.
“It is such an honor to be able to bring Allegiance to my hometown of Los Angeles and specifically to Little Tokyo,” comments Takei in an online statement. “During World War II, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 to imprison persons of Japanese ancestry in American concentration camps simply because we looked like the people who bombed Pearl Harbor. I spent my childhood in two of these camps, and this experience of courage, resilience, and survival against injustice is what inspired the story of Allegiance. We live in a time when the echoes of the forced incarceration of Japanese Americans rings once again, and Allegiance is a clarion call for us to not forget this chapter in American history... There’s never been a more important time for the stories of Allegiance to be told.”
Inspired by Takei’s life, Allegiance is a tale of love, war, and heroism set during the Japanese American internment of World War II. The musical follows the story of the Kimura family in the weeks and years after the attack on Pearl Harbor, as they are relocated from their farm in Salinas, California, to the Heart Mountain internment camp in the rural plains of Wyoming.
The show debuted on Broadway at the Longacre Theatre in fall 2015. It ran for 111 performances, closing on February 14, 2016. The Broadway production also starred Aladdin's Telly Leung and Tony winner Lea Salonga.
Flip through photos from the show below:
The L.A. staging will take place at JACCC’s Aratani Theatre, located at 244 S. San Pedro Street, Los Angeles. For more information visit AllegianceMusical.com/LA.
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