Blue Ivy Will Join Beyoncé in Mufasa: The Lion King
The 12-year-old will voice Kiara alongside her mother’s Nala.
Blue Ivy Carter is officially a crossover artist. Already an established fashion icon who has contributed to chart-toppers since birth, the 12-year-old can now add voice acting to her résumé. According to the credits in the teaser trailer for Mufasa: The Lion King — the Barry Jenkins–directed prequel to the 2019 live-action remake — Carter will join the cast. According to EW, she’ll voice Kiara, the daughter of Simba and Nala. Meanwhile, Beyoncé — Carter’s mother on and off the screen — will reprise her role as Nala.
It all started with an audiobook, Jenkins told EW. “A buddy of mine, Matthew Cherry, made the short film called Hair Love that Blue Ivy did the audiobook of. Starting this project and just having that in the ether, I was like, ‘Is it worth a shot? Would Blue Ivy want to do it? Would Beyoncé want to act opposite her daughter? Is it too close to home?’ But once we put the question to them, they both responded with enthusiasm.”
According to EW, the story will be told through flashbacks, which explains why we’re getting a young Mufasa and his granddaughter, Kiara, in the same movie. Jenkins told People that watching Beyoncé “both on the screen and behind the screen, get to be a mother — and how that affected and impacted for the better the work that we were all doing — was just really awesome.” Beyoncé has not yet commented, but she shared a shortened version of the trailer on her Instagram Stories.
Before this announcement, Renaissance Tour audiences got to watch Carter develop her dancing skills onstage when she joined her mother for performances of “My Power,” a song from the 2019 Lion King’s soundtrack. Was it a hint? Jenkins confirmed that the tour happened after the mother-daughter duo started working on the film but took no credit for any potential secret messaging. “They are a lot smarter than me, and they have a lot more going on than me, so if they were signaling to people, all good, but it was not my intention. I just thought she would do a wonderful job,” Jenkins told EW.
This is the logical next step if we want Blue Ivy to EGOT by the age of 25, which I have full confidence she will. In the meantime, the movie will be out in theaters December 20.