It was announced today that actor, Ansel Elgort’s, next role will take him out of the driver’s seat and into the dancing streets. Yes, the Baby Driver lead will play Tony in the upcoming Steven Spielberg-directed version of West Side Story.
After a lengthy casting search and concerns that the production might get shelved, Spielberg finally settled on Elgort as the new adaptation’s male lead. Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and Oscar nominee, Tony Kushner of Angels in America-fame, has signed on to the team in addition to the Tony-winning choreographer of the recent Broadway revival of Carousel, Justin Peck.
THR is reporting that Elgort will star in Spielberg’s West Side Story as Tony, the co-founder and former member of a white gang who call themselves the Jets and are based in the West Side’s Lincoln Square neighborhood. In the 1950s-set musical’s Romeo and Juliet-inspired story, Tony falls in love with Maria, the younger sister of Bernardo, the leader of a Puerto Rican gang known as the Sharks… and the Jets’ rivals in the West Side. Richard Beymer earned a Golden Globe nod for portraying Tony in the 1961 film.
Filming for Spielberg’s adaptation of West Side Story is set to start filming summer of next year and scheduled to be released in 2020. A little way off in the future, but that gives Elgort plenty of time to prove that he has what it takes to be a Jet.
Source: THR
