LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – For more than two decades, Death Note has refused to stay confined to a single medium. Since writer Tsugumi Ohba and illustrator Takeshi Obata first introduced the supernatural thriller in the pages of Weekly Shōnen Jump in 2003, the series has become one of Japan’s most successful cultural exports. More than 30 million manga copies have been sold worldwide, while the story has spawned a critically acclaimed anime, blockbuster live-action films, television dramas, novels, video games and a Netflix adaptation. Few modern franchises have travelled so seamlessly across cultures, and even fewer have inspired a musical.

Yet Death Note: The Musical has quietly become one of the franchise’s most celebrated incarnations. Written in English by Broadway composer Frank Wildhorn, lyricist Jack Murphy and book writer Ivan Menchell, the musical first premiered in Tokyo in 2015 before becoming a hit across Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. Now, following sold-out concert performances at the London Palladium in 2023, the story returns to London in a newly reimagined production at the Barbican Theatre, featuring a revised script, newly written songs and a creative team behind some of the West End’s biggest productions.

The story follows Light Yagami, a brilliant student who discovers a notebook with the power to kill anyone whose name is written inside it. But before Light’s descent into godlike power begins, there is Ryuk, the apple-loving Shinigami, or god of death, who drops the notebook into the human world out of sheer boredom. Detached from human ideas of morality, Ryuk is neither hero nor villain. He is an instigator, an observer and, perhaps most importantly, the audience’s guide through a world where justice and power become dangerously intertwined.

It’s precisely that ambiguity that drew Broadway veteran Telly Leung to the role. “It’s a double-edged sword,” Leung says. “Ryuk is such a delicious character in the manga and anime, and he’s just as deliciously fun in the musical. But it’s also nerve-racking because people already know and love him.”

For the Chinese-American performer, however, stepping into beloved characters is nothing new. Across a career spanning Broadway, television and international productions, Leung has portrayed everyone from Disney’s Aladdin to George Takei’s Allegiance. Most recently, he took on another theatrical icon as the Phantom in Masquerade, the immersive reimagining of The Phantom of the Opera. Each role came with audiences carrying their own expectations long before he stepped on stage. “You have to discover who your version of the character is,” he says. “I’ve been in that position before.”

That philosophy became the foundation of his approach to Ryuk. While many fans know the character through the anime’s distinctive voice performance, Leung knew a stage musical demanded something fundamentally different. Ryuk is no longer just speaking; he also has to sing, dance and command a live audience eight times a week. Trying to replicate the anime, he says, would have been both impossible and dishonest.

“I had to find my own way of doing it, to keep the mischief, the fun and the curiosity of Ryuk through my body and my voice,” he explains. “I’m not here to be a copycat. The story and the intention are the same, but they’re expressed through a different body and a different voice.”

Leung revisited both the anime and the manga during his preparation, but not as a blueprint. “I watched the anime and went through some of the manga just to get an idea of the character,” he says. “But then you have to let yourself find your own version.”

Interestingly, Ryuk arrives at a pivotal moment in Leung’s own artistic journey. After years spent playing heroes that include Disney princes, his recent turn as the Phantom opened up a darker, more mischievous side of his craft. “Playing the Phantom really let me dig into that mischievous, darker side that I hadn’t explored much before,” he says. “So it’s funny that Ryuk came next. I get to bring that same sense of mischief, darkness and otherworldliness into this role.”

It’s an intriguing creative throughline. Both the Phantom and Ryuk exist just outside ordinary humanity, quietly influencing the people around them while remaining strangely magnetic. Neither is a conventional villain, and both walk the fine line between menace and charm. For Leung, Ryuk feels like a natural continuation of that exploration.

If Ryuk represents a new creative chapter for Leung, this London production marks another evolution for Death Note itself. Although the story is often regarded as quintessentially Japanese, the musical has always been an international collaboration. Wildhorn, Murphy and Menchell wrote it in English before it was translated into Japanese for its world premiere in Tokyo. Ten years later, it returns to English in a production created specifically for London audiences at a time when anime, manga and Asian popular culture have become firmly embedded in the global mainstream.

“What we’re doing is really interesting,” Leung says. “The writers are American, but the musical premiered in Japan after being translated. Now it’s coming back into English for Western audiences at a time when so many people have embraced Asian culture, whether that’s anime, manga or K-pop. The world has become smaller. We’re all exposing each other to each other’s art.”

For Leung, the exchange works because the emotional language of music transcends culture. “Nobody writes melodies like Frank Wildhorn,” he says. “Whether you speak English or not, you’ll be humming the music.”

He also believes the musical medium is uniquely suited to Death Note. Much of the anime unfolds through inner monologues and psychological chess matches, where the real drama lies inside the characters’ minds rather than in explosive action. “So much of the anime is about what’s happening inside people’s heads,” he says. “The characters are constantly thinking. A musical lets you freeze time and sing those thoughts. In a way, the anime already does that, so this feels like a very natural adaptation.”

One of the production’s biggest departures from previous adaptations is its expanded exploration of the Shinigami themselves. Alongside Ryuk, audiences spend more time with fellow gods of death Rem and Jealous, revealing a side of these supernatural beings that is surprisingly human. “In our version, we’ve made the gods more human as the humans become more godlike,” Leung explains. “We don’t normally think of gods as being bored or curious or having crushes or breaking the rules.”

It is a striking inversion. As Light gradually assumes the power to decide who deserves to live or die, he begins believing he can shape a new world in his own image. Meanwhile, the supposedly immortal gods reveal boredom, curiosity, affection and vulnerability. The further Light moves towards divinity, the more human the Shinigami become. “What would any of us do if we had that kind of power?” Leung asks. “If we could execute justice ourselves?”

That question, he believes, has kept Death Note relevant for more than twenty years. Beneath the supernatural premise lies a dilemma with no easy answer, one that continues to resonate in an era where questions of justice, authority and accountability feel increasingly complex.

For Leung, however, the emotional centre of Death Note isn’t the notebook at all. It’s the relationship between Light and the detective L. Often framed as a battle between justice and evil, he sees something far more nuanced. “The chase is the purpose,” he says. “They chase each other because it gives their life meaning. There’s hatred there, but there’s also a deep level of love and respect.”

From Ryuk’s perspective, that obsession is precisely what makes humanity so fascinating. He doesn’t descend to Earth looking to tip the scales of justice or to watch the world burn. He comes because he’s bored. What he discovers instead is two brilliant minds whose identities become completely defined by one another. Ryuk watches with curiosity and amusement, becoming almost a surrogate for the audience as the psychological chess match unfolds. “He’s bored when he comes to Earth,” Leung laughs. “Then he sees this chase between two enemies, and while there’s hate between them, there’s also this strangely deep level of love and respect.”

Despite the show’s reputation for darkness, Leung insists audiences shouldn’t mistake it for a nihilistic story. “There are a lot of deaths, so people think Death Note is dark and macabre,” he says. “But when you leave the theatre, it’s actually life-affirming.”

“When you start questioning death, you start understanding the value of life.”

That idea has become one of the show’s most enduring takeaways for him. “We could all have only forty seconds left,” he says, referencing the notebook’s infamous rule. “We never know.”

Leung is also acutely aware that he is only the latest performer to inherit Ryuk. Long before stepping into rehearsals, the character had already been shaped by the original manga, the anime’s celebrated voice actors and the performers who have brought Death Note: The Musical to stages across Asia.

“I’m standing on the shoulders of everyone who came before me,” he says. “The anime voice actors gave life to those original manga panels. I’m taking all of that incredible work and adding live performance, singing and theatre. We all lovingly borrow from one another.”

Although Death Note: The Musical has existed for a decade, Leung says the Barbican company has deliberately resisted treating it as a revival. Instead, the cast has approached it as though the story were being written for the first time. “We’ve treated it like a new show,” he says. “What if Death Note was written yesterday? How does it resonate now?”

Perhaps that is the secret behind Death Note‘s remarkable longevity. Beyond the supernatural notebook, the gods of death and the battle of wits between Light and L lies a story that continually asks audiences to examine their own beliefs about justice, morality and power. Every new adaptation, from manga and anime to film and now the stage, offers a different lens through which to explore those questions.

For Leung, however, the story’s lasting impact comes back to something much simpler. “When you start questioning death,” he says, “you start understanding the value of life.”

For a story that begins with a notebook capable of ending a life in forty seconds, it’s a fitting reminder that Death Note has never really been about death at all. It’s about what we choose to do with the time we’re given.

Death Note: The Musical runs at the Barbican Centre in London from 30th July to 12th September 2026 for a strictly limited season. More information and information available here