Further casting has been announced for the first ever UK and Ireland tour of the acclaimed West End musical The Drifters Girl, which will visit Wales Millennium Centre on 7-11 May 2024.
Carly Mercedes Dyer, a former star of Six the Musical who also delighted audiences with her performances as Erma in Anything Goes, will play music industry change-maker, Faye Treadwell.
Carly will star alongside Ashford Campbell (competed in The X Factor as member of The Risk, The Drifters Girl) who will be playing the roles of Ben E. King, Rudy Lewis and others, and Daniel Haswell (Motwown: The Musical, The Book of Mormon) who will be playing Johnny Moore, Gerhart Thrasher and others. Miles Anthony Daley (Tina Turner: The Musical) will be playing George Treadwell and others, and Tarik Frimpong (The Wiz, Aladdin) will be playing Clyde McPhatter, Lover Patterson and others.
Jaydah Bell-Ricketts (A Little Princess, School Of Rock) will be joining the cast in her first touring role as Girl. Completing the cast is Loren Anderson, Tre Copeland-Williams, Ethan Davis, Matthew Dawkins and Linseigh Green.
The Drifters Girl tells the remarkable story of The Drifters, one of the world’s greatest vocal groups and the truth about the woman who made them. Faye Treadwell is the legendary manager of The Drifters who fought for three decades alongside her husband (George Treadwell) to turn Atlantic Records’ hottest vocal group into a global phenomenon.
From the highs of hit records and sell-out tours to the lows of legal battles and personal tragedy, The Drifters Girl charts the trailblazing efforts of the world’s first African American female music manager and how she refused to ever give up on the group she loved. Thirty years and hundreds of hit songs later, there is no doubt that Faye Treadwell was and always will be, The Drifters Girl.
The Drifters Girl boasts an incredible soundtrack of some of the most famous songs in history, including Save The Last Dance For Me, Under The Boardwalk, Kissin In The Back Row Of The Movies, Stand By Me, Come On Over To My Place, Saturday Night At The Movies and many more.
With a book by Ed Curtis, The Drifters Girl is based on an idea by Tina Treadwell and is co-created by Beverley Knight, Adam J Bernard, Tarinn Callender, Matt Henry and Tosh Wanogho-Maud. It is directed by Jonathan Church. Set design is by Anthony Ward, choreography by Karen Bruce, costume design by Fay Fullerton, lighting design by Ben Cracknell, sound design by Tom Marshall, video design by Andrzej Goulding, orchestrations by Chris Egan and Will Stuart as Musical Supervisor.
Tickets for The Drifters Girl are on sale now: https://www.wmc.org.uk/en/whats-on/2024/drifters-girl
