NEW YORK – Blue Ivy Carter will be joining her mother, American pop star Beyonce Knowles-Carter, in the movie musical Mufasa: The Lion King, which is expected in theatres in December.

The musical – a prequel to The Lion King, the 2019 hyper-realistic remake of the Disney classic starring Beyonce as the voice of Nala – will be directed by Barry Jenkins, who won a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for Moonlight (2016).

Blue Ivy, 12, will make her feature film debut by voicing Kiara, daughter of Nala and Simba, who will again be voiced by American actor Donald Glover.

“A buddy of mine, Matthew Cherry, made the short film called Hair Love (2019) that Blue Ivy did the audiobook of,” Jenkins, 44, told Entertainment Weekly in an article published on April 29.

“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 Beyonce want to act opposite her daughter? Is it too close to home?’” said the American film-maker.

“But once we put the question to them, they both responded with enthusiasm.”

Representatives for Beyonce did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In 2023, Blue Ivy joined Beyonce onstage during the Renaissance tour, which wrapped up in October.

The eldest child of Beyonce and American rapper Jay-Z already has a Grammy, for Best Music Video for Brown Skin Girl (2020), a single by her mother. Beyonce holds the record for most Grammys in history, with 32 wins.

The Lion King, which was directed by Jon Favreau, was a box-office smash, earning US$192 million (S$262 million) at theatres in the United States and Canada in its first weekend. It ultimately made more than US$1.5 billion in ticket sales globally. NYTIMES