Golden Globe winner Sandra Oh and BAFTA Film Award nominee Michelle Yeoh are set to co-star as voice actors in an animated film of Laurence Yep’s 2003 middle-grade fantasy novel, The Tiger’s Apprentice, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
The cast also includes Henry Golding, best known for his role in the 2018 romantic comedy Crazy Rich Asians, based on the Kirkus-starred 2013 bestseller by Kevin Kwan. Golding will play the titular tiger, who, in the novel, must guard a powerful, magical object—a phoenix egg—from monstrous forces. Early on, he meets a 12-year-old San Francisco resident, Tom Lee, who becomes his apprentice. They get help in their adventures from a dragon named Mistral (to be voiced by Oh) and other creatures, including a golden monkey and a flying rat. (Yeoh’s role has yet to be announced.)
Yep’s novel is the first installment of a trilogy that includes 2005’s Tiger’s Blood and 2006’s Tiger Magic, but it’s unclear if animated adaptations of the latter two books are currently in the works. The Tiger’s Apprentice film is set for release in early 2023.
Oh was recently nominated for an Emmy for her portrayal of British Intelligence operative Eve Polastri in the BBC America show Killing Eve, based on an espionage-thriller series by Luke Jennings; she won a Golden Globe for the same role last year.
Yeoh received her BAFTA Film Award nomination for her work in the acclaimed 2000 action film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which was adapted from a 1948 novel by Wang Dulu; more recently, she appeared with Golding in Crazy Rich Asians, and in a recurring role in the CBS All Access TV series Star Trek: Discovery. Golding also co-starred in the 2018 thriller A Simple Favor, from the 2017 Darcey Bell novel.
David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.
