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Death Note Musical's 2020 Run Reveals Main Cast

The official website for the new run of Frank Wildhorn's Death Note the Musical announced the new main cast members on Thursday.

The new cast members are:

• Ryōta Murai as Light Yagami
• Fū Takahashi as L
• Sakura Kiryūū as Misa Amane
• Hirari Nishida as Sayu Yagami
• Hye-na Park as Rem
• Eiji Yokota as Ryuk
• Kiyotaka Imai as Sōichirō Yagami

The character Light will be double-cast, and the production is now holding nationwide auditions for the second actor for the role.

The musical's new run will debut in Toshima Ward Performing Arts Exchange Theater (Owl Spot) in Tokyo in 2020. There are also plans for the run to continue in various locations in Japan and overseas.

The musical debuted in 2015 and had a rerun in Japan in 2017.

Frank Wildhorn, an American composer known for songs sung by Whitney Houston ("Where Do Broken Hearts Go?") and Natalie Cole, scored the Death Note musical. Tamiya Kuriyama, a recipient of the Japanese government's Medal with Purple Ribbon, is once again directing. Jack Murphy (The Civil War, Rudolf, Carmen, Wonderland, The Count of Monte Cristo) wrote the lyrics, and Ivan Menchell (The Cemetery Club, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Bonnie and Clyde) wrote the script.

In Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata's original 2003-2006 supernatural suspense manga, teenager Light Yagami finds a notebook with which he can put people to death by writing their names. He begins a self-anointed crusade against the criminals of the world, and a cat-and-mouse game begins with the authorities and one idiosyncratic genius detective.

In addition to the 2006 television anime adaptation and tie-in specials, Death Note also received a Japanese live-action film adaptation in 2006, with a sequel titled Death Note: The Last Name, and a spinoff titled L change the WorLd in 2008. A live-action television series adaptation premiered in July 2015, and ended in September 2015. A new film titled Death Note: Light up the NEW world, described as a "forbidden sequel" to the first live-action film, opened in Japan in October 2016. Viz Media released the manga, previous Japanese live-action films, anime, and other tie-in projects in North America, and Crunchyroll streamed the live-action television series. Funimation licensed the Death Note, Death Note: The Last Name, and Death Note Light up the NEW world films and will release the films on home video on January 22.

The original manga also inspired a Netflix live-action film that debuted in 2017.

Sources: Death Note musical's website, Anime! Anime! (MoA)