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Cast for My Neighbor Totoro London Stage Play is Announced

posted on by Andrew Osmond
The play by the Royal Shakespeare Company will run at London's Barbican Centre for 15 weeks from October, with puppets by Jim Henson's Creature Shop

The cast for the upcoming Royal Shakespeare Company stage version of Hayao Miyazaki's My Neighbor Totoro, which will run at London's Barbican Centre from October, has been announced.

Mei Mac, who plays the younger sister character Mei, previously played the role of San in a stage version of Miyazaki's film Princess Mononoke created by the British company Whole Hog Theatre, which played both in London and Shibuya, Tokyo in 2013.

The cast is below, with the character names in bold.

Ami Okumura Jones (Satsuki), Mei Mac (Mei), Nino Furuhata (Kanta/ Puppeteer), Haruka Abe (Yasuko/ Puppeteer), Nino Furuhata (Kanta/ Puppeteer), Susan Momoko Hingley (Miss Hara/ Puppeteer), Haruka Kuroda (Nurse Emiko/ Puppeteer), Kanako Nakano (Tsukiko/ Puppeteer), Michael Phong Le (Hiroshi>/ Puppeteer), Dai Tabuchi (Tatsuo/ Puppeteer) and Jacqueline Tate (Granny/ Puppeteer).

The other puppeteers are as follows:

Li-Leng Au, Boaz Chad, Andrew Futaishi, Zachary Hing, Yojiro Ichikawa, Arina Ii, Marian Lee, Matthew Leonhart, Aki Nakagawa, Tobi Poster-Su, Si Rawlinson and Shaofan Wilson.

It was previously announced that Jim Henson's Creature Shop will be supplying live-size puppets for the play. Tickets are available at this link. The play will have a 15-week run from October 8, 2022 to January 21, 2023.

Tom Morton-Smith (Oppenheimer) is adapting the story, and Phelim McDermott (Akhnaten) directs the production. The play is made in collaboration with the English theatre company Improbable and Japan's Nippon TV.

The RSC describes the production on its website:

The global premiere of Studio Ghibli's My Neighbor Totoro comes to London's Barbican stage this autumn.

"The celebrated 1988 animated feature film by Hayao Miyazaki will be brought to the stage by its original composer Joe Hisaishi in a landmark new adaption by the RSC written by playwright Tom Morton-Smith.

"This enchanting coming-of-age story explores the magical fantasy world of childhood and the transformative power of imagination, as it follows one extraordinary summer in the lives of sisters Satsuki and Mei.

"My Neighbor Totoro will play a strictly limited 15-week season from 8 October 2022 - 21 January 2023 and promises to delight all generations.

The original anime film My Neighbor Totoro is the story of two young sisters, Mei and Satsuki, who move to the countryside and encounter Totoro, wonderful creatures which only children can see.


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