DEM Productions are delighted to announce, thatthe musical stage adaptation of THE BOOK THIEF, based on best-selling novel by Markus Zusak, will have a special concert performance at the Prince of Wales Theatre (a Delfont Mackintosh Theatre) on Sunday 19 October 2025, starring Melanie La Barrie as Death.
Melanie La Barrie is best known for originating the role of Hermes in the West End premiere of Hadestown, for which she won the 2025 WhatsOnStage Award for Best Supporting Performer in a Musical. Her previous theatre credits include &Juliet (West End & Broadway); We Aren’t Kids Anymore (Savoy Theatre); Wicked (Apollo Victoria Theatre); Dick Whittington (National Theatre); The Everyman Season (Everyman Playhouse, Liverpool); Matilda The Musical (RSC & Cambridge Theatre); Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax (The Old Vic); Mary Poppins (Prince Edward Theatre); Les Misérables (Sondheim Theatre); Play Mas (Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond) and Bakkhai (Almeida Theatre). She is currently appearing as Nurse in Mary Page Marlowe at The Old Vic.
Further casting to be announced.
The musical, based on Markus Zusak’s 16 million-copy global best-seller, has a book by award-winning best-selling author Jodi Picoult (My Sister’s Keeper & Small Great Things) and Timothy Allen McDonald (adaptor of Roald Dahl’s Willy Wonka & James and the Giant Peach) with music and lyrics by Kate Anderson and Elyssa Samsel (Apple TV’s Central Park & Olaf’s Frozen Adventure).
On this London concert performance writers Jodi Picoult & Timothy Allen McDonaldsaid: “We couldn’t be prouder to present this new, gorgeous incarnation of THE BOOK THIEF in London. As Americans, we are very much aware of how quickly fascism can take hold of a country — this show is the right story, at exactly the right time. To have Melanie La Barrie leading the company as Death, our narrator, is a dream — her immense talent and experience has given us so many colours we writers can paint with.”
THE BOOK THIEF concert performance will be directed and choreographed by Tom Jackson Greaves (The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry; Whistle Down The Wind) after original direction by Lotte Wakeham (The Book Thief, Little Shop Of Horrors), with libretto by Jodi Picoult (Breathe; Between The Lines) & Timothy Allen McDonald (Roald Dahl’s James & The Giant Peach and Willy Wonka), music and lyrics by Elyssa Samsel & Kate Anderson (Olaf’s Frozen Adventure; Central Park), orchestrations & musical supervision by Matthew Malone (Spend, Spend, Spend; Brassed Off), set & costume Design by Good Teeth (Piaf; Aladdin), lighting design by Nic Farman (Allegiance, The Diary of a CEO Live), sound design by Sound Quiet Time (Stanger Things: The First Shadow), casting by Abby Galvin (The Leftbehinds; The Lonely Londoners) and musical direction by Natalie Pound (This Is My Family; Next to Normal).
