Australian actress Julia Dray travels from the UK to play Carole King in Gold Coast production

A multi-talented Australian theatre professional has been cast in the lead role of a Gold Coast stage supremo’s next big production.

UK-based Australian Julia Dray will play famed songstress Carole King in ‘Beautiful – The Carole King Musical’ production which is coming to The Star Gold Coast.

Dray, an accomplished singer, dancer and theatre actor, is no newcomer to the role of King whose decorated career spans a hit list including You’ve Got a Friend and Locomotion. King was a luminary of the music scene in the 1960s and 1970s.

Ms Dray was a key cast member of the Beautiful Carole King Australian ‘The Natural Woman’ Tour back in 2013, before she relocated to London’s Covent Garden. Ms Dray has more recently been the understudy for the Carole King role in a UK production which toured in 2018.

Now the 33 year old has finally been cast as the leading lady in Matt Ward Entertainment’s production scheduled to hit The Star Gold Coast theatre for nearly a month long season. It will run from March 11 to April 9, supporting 80 jobs and 20 cast members.

Ms Dray’s CV is littered with acting and singing roles spanning more than a decade:

I’m a performing artist living in the UK. I’ve recently toured the UK and Australia with Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, as Dance Captain covering the roles of Carole King, Cynthia Weil, Genie Klein and Ensemble.

Beautiful resonates with everyone. Truthfully, every single person who watches this show will end up saying “oh I LOVE this song. It’s going to surprise people how many hits Carole and Gerry Goffin wrote. Personally I resonate with Carole’s journey to finding her own voice and stepping out as an independent artist. Carole quietly worked in the background for years and years. She was a prodigy at such a young age, and had an innate ability to connect musically with universal emotions. But before she released Tapestry, people didn’t even know who she was. Stepping out into the spotlight now, I feel like I’ll have the chance to connect with her even more. My next step will be starting to write and sing my own music – a lifelong dream.

Masterful Gold Coast musical producer Matt Ward:

After a nation-wide search to find our leading lady, we are thrilled to announce Julia Dray will step into the shoes of Carole King. Despite this not being Julia’s first time performing in Beautiful, we are delighted it will be her first time officially cast in the title role.

I expect audiences to fall in love with — not only this iconic musical, featuring 30 plus greatest hits of Carole King – but too, with our leading lady Julia Dray. Julia commands audience attention and affection, much like Carole King.

We had over 100 audition submissions from artists across the country. It was Julia’s video submission, all the way from the UK, that most impressed the creative team.

Time zone proved challenging due to Julia being UK based during casting in Melbourne and on the Gold Coast. It was almost midnight in London when we first heard Julia sing ‘You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Woman’. At that moment we knew we found our Carole King.

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Season Details

Venue: The Star Gold Coast, QLD
Date: March – April 2023

For more information click HERE