The Kite Runner 2017

A stage version of Khaled Hossein's 2003 novel The Kite Runner, which has been published in 70 countries, selling 31.5 million copies in 60 languages, is headed to the West End's Wyndham's Theatre.

Performances begin December 21 prior to an official opening January 10, 2017, for a run through March 11.

The play, completed before the release of the feature-film adaptation, was first produced in San Francisco in 2009 by The San Jose Repertory. Its U.K. stage debut, originally co-produced by Nottingham Playhouse and Liverpool Everyman, toured the U.K. in 2013.

The cast is led by Ben Turner, best known for playing Staff Nurse Jay Faldren for three years in BBC1's Casualty, reprising the role he played on tour.

Adapted by Matthew Spangler and directed by Giles Croft, it is now brought to the West End by Martin Dodd for UK Productions and Derek Nicol and Paul Walden for Flying Entertainment.

The play tells the story of Amir, a young boy from the Wazir Akbar Khan district of Kabul, whose closest friend is Hassan, his father's young Hazara servant, against a backdrop that encompasses the fall of Afghanistan's monarchy through the Soviet invasion, the exodus of refugees to Pakistan and the United States, and the rise of the Taliban regime. It charts a friendship that spans cultures and continents and follows one man's journey to confront his past and find redemption.