Meet the rising Brit actor playing gay character Christian in Clueless the Musical
Christian was played by Justin Walker in the original 1995 version of Clueless (Paramount Pictures)
Clueless the Musical is set to open at London’s Trafalgar Theatre on Saturday (15 February).
Based on the 1995 cult-classic movie, and inspired by the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth – her seminal novel Emma forms the basis of the story – Clueless follows Cher Horowitz, a high-school student who is excellent at matchmaking everyone but herself.
When she embarks on her biggest project yet, making over her friend Tai and finding her a boyfriend, Cher realises that she needs to re-evaluate her priorities to find the man of her own dreams.
Amy Heckerling, who wrote and directed the film, has also written the book for the musical while singer-songwriter KT Tunstall has written the music.
“I am totally in love with the brilliant new talent we have been working with and can’t wait for audiences to be thrilled with their singing, dancing, their heart and humour,” Heckerling said.
Emma Flynn and Keelan McAuley will play lead characters Cher and Josh respectively, while Isaac J Lewis takes the role of much-loved gay character Christian Stovitz.
Christian is loosely based on Emma‘s Frank Churchill, and serves as a love interest for Cher as she breaks her “no high-school boys” policy to pursue him.
But it turns out that Christian is gay, so they become shopping buddies instead.
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Speaking to PinkNews, KT Tunstall teased that Christian’s story arc will be “quite honest, quite true to the film”.
“Christian isn’t completely comfortable being out in the school… a lot of the other kids do know and they don’t care”, the singer added.
Lewis hails from Bristol but now lives in London, having trained in musical theatre at the Arts Educational School.
A fast-rising star in the West End theatre scene, he’s already has had roles in mammoth productions like The Book of Mormon, Hairspray, Dr Zhivago and A Chorus Line.
He also played the lead role in the stage version of Catch Me If You Can.
Sharing a picture of himself next to an advert for Clueless the Musical on the London Underground last month, Lewis wrote that he was “buzzing” to be part of the production.
Clueless runs from Saturday (15 February) until 14 June. You can book here.
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