Salonga & Takei to Star in Broadway Bound ALLEGIANCE Reading

Tony-award winning actress Lea Salonga (Miss Saigon, Les Miserables) and television and film icon George Takei (Star Trek, Heroes) will return to portray the roles of Gloria Suzuki and Old Sam Omura in a developmental reading of the new Broadway-bound musical, Allegiance, on October 25th at the Julia Miles Theatre in New York City. Telly Leung (Flower Drum Song, Pacific Overture, Wicked, Rent) and Allie Trimm (13, Bye Bye Birdie) also star. Allegiance is produced by Lorenzo Thione and Sing Out, Louise! Productions.

Allegiance tells the story of the Omura family during World War II and the years of the internment of Japanese Americans. The show is an epic story of survival, love, loss and redemption, with music and lyrics by Jay Kuo, and book by Jay Kuo and Lorenzo Thione, "Allegiance is a major musical about a forgotten part of history," says Takei, who spent his childhood in an internment camp in Arkansas, and "the first time that the story of the most egregious violation of the US constitution is being told on the national stage."

This reading of Allegiance is directed by Stafford Arima, with music direction and arrangements by Lynne Shankel. Allegiance's cast also features Alan Ariano, Michael K. Lee, Christine Toy Johnson, Philip Hoffman, Sally Wilfert, Paolo Montalban, and Jason Tam, as well as Gaelen Gilliland, Raymond J. Lee, Daniel C. Levine, Doan MacKenzie, Ann Sanders, Tally Sessions, Cary Teddor, Anne Fraser Tomas and Kay Trinidad.

Following this reading in 2010, Allegiance will hold its World Premiere in 2011 in a regional theater to be announced, with a planned Broadway bow in 2012, which marks the 70th anniversary of the internment of Japanese Americans in the U.S.