Light and Ryuk Sing in Death Note: The Musical

On July 30, Death Note: The Musical comes to the stage at London's Barbican Centre, due to run for 50 performances until September 12. In the last days before curtains up, I could interview two of the main performers. Xander Pang plays Light Yagami, the student who's gifted the titular notebook that kills. Telly Leung plays the bored death god Ryuk, who opts to accompany Light on his murderous quest for perfect justice.

The musical is based on the Shonen Jump manga written by Tsugumi Ohba and illustrated by Takeshi Obata, and later turned into an anime series by Madhouse.

Death Note: The Musical first ran in Japan and South Korea in 2015. As mentioned in the interview, a concert version of the musical ran in London in 2023. The songs were composed by Frank Wildhorn, who has also composed musical versions of Fist of the North Star and Your Lie in April. (I interviewed him in 2024 when the latter musical came to London.)

Death Note: The Musical's website is at https://deathnotethemusical.com/.

Were either of you familiar with Death Note before being cast in this musical?

Telly LEUNG (Ryuk):I had heard of Death Note because of the concert versions that were here in London's West End. My buddy Adam Pascal, whom I performed with in Rent for a long time, actually played Ryuk. I remember him telling me about the project. I'm a music theater person, so my way into the anime and the manga, finding out about them, was through Adam doing the concert. Now I'm hoping the same thing happens - that a lot of people who are theater fans are introduced to anime by coming to the theater.

Xander PANG (Light):I think growing up in an East Asian community, Death Note was it was something that was not only part of my childhood, but also my culture. It's just one of the pillars of the anime community. I hadn't watched the show until recently, but it was always something I was aware of. I already kind of knew the story, how it goes, the concept.

Can each of you describe how you see your character?

LEUNG: Sure. I think I think as far as my character goes, it sort of aligns with the manga and anime. I think Ryuk is a Shinagami who is bored with his everyday humdrum Shinigami life, the Shinigami realm, and he is fascinated by these humans who expire but who make very interesting choices. They choose to love and live hard. Why is that, knowing that they have an expiration date? So I think he's fascinated by them, and he comes to Earth.

As far as the story aligns with the source material, that's very much the same. The interesting part, I think, is how we tell it. We have incredible theater designers who have reimagined this world, led by our director: our set designer, our costume designer, our lighting designer. How is the story told through dance? How do these characters relay their thoughts via music? What I loved about the Death Note anime was that so often these characters were animated with their mouths closed, but the audience could hear their thoughts, which happens naturally in a musical. In a musical, time sort of stops, and the characters get to sing their feelings and their thoughts. And so in many ways, the Death Note musical is aligned with the source material. It's just that we get to do our own take on it.

Xander, what's your perspective as Light?

PANG: Building on what Telly just said, the anime itself is already quite theatrical. It's not just in the way the story is told, but even the way the characters act. You're watching it and sometimes you wouldn't be surprised if someone just broke out into song. And I think our version really builds on that. I don't think we're necessarily trying to do things that other adaptations haven't done before. I feel like we're kind of building on the lore in a sense, we're adding to things that have already existed.

Approaching this character, a huge part of it is staying true to the source material. I think the arc is really important, obviously for my character Light, but also in terms of what the story is trying to say about the corruption of power. That really boils down to where we see Light at the beginning of the show, at the middle of the show, and at the end. I think we're finding our way to milk those moments as much as we can, and really show the audience what the journey is like, from a schoolboy who wants to do the right thing, and how that snowballs to a kid with a God complex.

How would you describe Light and Ryuk's chemistry in the musical?

LEUNG: There's no chemistry, I despise this person! (Laughs). No, it's fun! Xander is a talented young star on the rise, and I am amazed at his stage maturity. Already there is a curious part of 46 year-old Telly thinking, how is this young man leading the show with such grace and talent? Human, how are you accomplishing all this and not stressing out? He doesn't realize what a big deal this is and how much pressure and he's just doing it - that “youth ignorance is bliss” thing. I think our on-stage relationship is very much built on our off-stage friendship as well.

PANG: After scene two, we're bound by life and death, but it's been it's been a privilege. I've learned so much on this job from all the people I'm surrounded by, and Telly has guided me like my theater dad. But it's very easy to build up a relationship, especially with how the relationship in the show is built up with a kind of sinister guiding force. Telly's just the least evil person in the world, so seeing him turn that evilness into mischief, which comes very naturally to him, is super inspiring.

Telly, how much of a challenge is it to perform in Shinigami costume and make-up?

LEUNG: That's not new to me. I've certainly had my fair share of heavy make-up roles. I was a drag queen, Angel, in Rent and I just finished playing the Phantom of the Opera in Masquerade. I'm used to prosthetics and things on my face, and corsets and tights and heels. But I will say, I really want the anime fans to come to the theater with an open mind.

The visual of what Ryuk looks like has existed in anime, in manga panels and also a Netflix adaptation with special effects. Now you have theater artists who are creating a three-dimensional, flesh and blood world of this thing that only existed two-dimensionally or on film. So the sound of him, the look of him, I think, going to be inspired by all those (other) things. But then you have Tony Award-winning designers and Olivier Award -winning choreographers, reinterpreting this material for 2026. The spirit and the essence is the same, but the look of it will be different.

There's obviously going to be nods for all of the fans that come, little Easter eggs in the costumes and makeup, but it is also its own original design as well. That's for all the people coming to it fresh, like me. You know, there's going to be lots of people at the Barbican that don't know anything about anime and will come thinking, “Oh, I want to see this new musical." We are introducing this world to them for the very first time. Our designers said, 'If we were to look at this as a piece written yesterday that didn't have an anime or a manga, what would our brains and our creativity come up with?'