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Brokeback Mountain Stage Adaptation to Open in London with Actors Lucas Hedges and Mike Faist

Brokeback Mountain stage adaptation to run in the West End
Brokeback Mountain stage adaptation to run in the West End

Soho Place/Instagram

There's no quitting Brokeback Mountain.

The Oscar-winning 2005 film starring Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal is getting a stage adaptation in London's West End.

The new play, created by the team behind the hit musical Everybody's Talking About Jamie, will star Mike Faist (West Side Story) as Jack and Lucas Hedges (Manchester by the Sea) as Ennis. Both are making their West End stage debuts in a new adaptation of Annie Proulx's short story.

The story will take place in Wyoming in 1963 and follows Ennis and Jack as they work on the isolated Brokeback Mountain. "All their certainties of life change forever as they flounder in unexpected emotional waters of increasing depth," a synopsis of the play, which spans a love story of 20 years, says.

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Proulx said writer Ashley Robinson's adaption of her story "is fresh and deeply moving, opening sight lines not visible in the original nor successive treatments."

In a press release, Robinson said that it was an honor "to be entrusted by Annie Proulx to bring new life in new form to her timeless and universal story", adding: "Grateful as all hell to reunite with Jonathan Butterell and to put this piece in his skilled and sensitive hands—what lucky actors, what a lucky team, and what a lucky production, all coming together under Nica Burns, in her marvel of a new space, @sohoplace. Let's ride."

Dear Evan Hansen Broadway Closing Night
Dear Evan Hansen Broadway Closing Night

Bruce Glikas/Getty Mike Faist

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Dan Gillespie Sells wrote original music for the production, which will be performed by Eddi Reader, joined by her onstage country and western band. Gillespie Sells said "the material and this complex story is inspiring to compose for. I've really enjoyed reconnecting with a genre of music I grew up with and using it to serve the drama of each moment."

"Yen" Cast Photocall
"Yen" Cast Photocall

Laura Cavanaugh/Getty

Brokeback Mountain will be performed at Soho Place in London's West End from May 10 - August 12.