This revival of Alfred Uhry’s touching play comes to the West End following a run on Broadway.
Best known for the 1989 film of the same name which starred Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman, Driving Miss Daisy is set in the American Deep South in the second half of the 20th century and tells the story of aging widowed Jewish woman, Daisy Werthan, who is deemed unfit to drive by her son Boolie. He hires African American man Hoke Coleburn to be her chauffeur, and what begins as a troubled and hostile pairing soon becomes a profound, life-altering friendship that transcends the social and racial barriers placed between them.
Vanessa Redgrave, James Earl Jones and Boyd Gaines reprise the roles they created on Broadway for this West End run of Driving Miss Daisy.
Much loved British actress Redgrave has enjoyed a long career across stage, television and film beginning in the 1960s. She was last seen in the West End in The Year Of Magical Thinking at the National Theatre, where she has previously worked on several occasions. Her screen roles include classic 60s film Isadora and more recent offerings Atonement, Girl Interrupted, television show Nip/Tuck and Coriolanus.
Earl Jones, who plays Hoke in Driving Miss Daisy, is well known for his distinctive voice which has been used to play Darth Vader in Star Wars and Mustafa in The Lion King. In addition to his regular screen credits he is a frequent face on the New York stage, where his credits have included Master Harold And The Boys, The Iceman Cometh, The Great White Hope (Tony Award) and Fences (Tony Award).
They are joined in Driving Miss Daisy by Gaines, a four-times Tony winner whose credits include Gypsy, Journey’s End, Twelve Angry Men and She Loves Me.
For more about Driving Miss Daisy at the Wyndham’s theatre read the First Night Feature or the Big Interview with James Earl Jones.