Ice Cube has joined Disney’s new musical adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist, according to The Hollywood Reporter. He will play Fagin, the adult ringleader of a gang of young pickpockets, in a modernization helmed by Hamilton director Thomas Kail. Cube is writing a treatment for the film with Jeff Kwatinetz. It will be co-produced by Cube, Kwatinetz, and Marc Platt (Wicked). Disney previously adapted the story as an animated film, 1988’s Oliver & Company. There is currently no timetable for the musical’s release.
Last year, Ice Cube co-produced the N.W.A. biopic Straight Outta Compton. In July, it was announced that he was producing a game show called “Hip Hop Squares” for VH1.
Read our feature, “Who Got the Camera? N.W.A's Embrace of “Reality,” 1988-1992,” from The Pitchfork Review.
Revisit Ice Cube’s “It Was a Good Day” video:
