Photo Flash: In Rehearsal for Metta Theatre's Reimagined Tour of JUNGLE BOOK, Coming to London This Summer

Award-winning Metta Theatre's JUNGLE BOOK will be touring nationally from 22 April at the Theatre Royal Windsor, with a run slated for London from 13-28 August 2016. Acclaimed street dance choreographer Kendra J Horsburgh is collaborating with Artistic Directors Poppy Burton-Morgan and William Reynolds on a new version of JUNGLE BOOK using street dance, circus and spoken word. Rehearsals are underway at the London Bubble, and BroadwayWorld has a sneak peek at the company below!

Poppy Burton-Morgan's radical re-imagining of Kipling's much loved, albeit problematically colonialist, classic sees JUNGLE BOOK transposed to a contemporary urban jungle of fleet-footed Wolves, street dancing Monkeys, a beat-boxing bin man Baloo and graffiti artist Bagheera. Kipling for the 21st century - this production will simultaneously astonish with its physical virtuosity and challenge with its politics.

Metta Theatre are known for their powerful visual storytelling and exploration of multi-cultural stories often from a female perspective. In JUNGLE BOOK we follow Mowgli on her search for identity and belonging - vulnerable, isolated and trying to find her place in an alien environment. The story transcends boundaries and will resonate with audiences young and old, urban and rural.

Sound artist Filipe Gomes has created a beat-driven score using real world sounds of the city. Add to this designer William Reynolds' trademark minimalism and an urban jungle is created - a stark forest of streetlamps disguising circus equipment on which these recognisably human animals cavort and contort themselves. The show uses street dance and circus to explore the search for identity and belonging in contemporary multi-cultural Britain.

The diverse and multi-skilled cast includes some of the UK's leading street dancers and circus performers. Acclaimed dance trapeze artist Natalie Nicole James plays Mowgli, both Kloé Dean (Bagheera) and Dean Stewart (Shere Khan)are also members of the leading streetdance company Boy Blue and specialise in a wide range of dance styles including Krump, Popping, Breaking and Hip Hop; trapeze artist Nathalie Alison (Kaa) is an emerging trapeze prodigy - the youngest cast member at just 21; Stefan Puxon (Baloo) and Matt Knight (Akela) have extensive credits including appearances with Pixie Lott, Will Young, Beverley Knight, David Hasselhoff and Robbie Wiliams, and dancer Ellen Wolf (Raksha) recently performed in the James Bond film Spectre and is a member of Birdgang Dance.

Photo Credit: Richard Davenport

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