Jasmine's journey from Shropshire to the West End

BBC News

06-07-2025

It was watching the Lion King musical at the Birmingham Hippodrome aged 11 that made Jasmine Jia Yung Shen realise she wanted to forge a career on stage.Now 27, she has achieved that near-lifelong dream - landing a role in Hamilton on London's West End.Growing up in Ludlow, Shropshire, she had started dancing and performing aged four but as a teenager, she realised that to pursue her goal she would have to leave the county. "You're born in Ludlow, you're raised in Ludlow, you might stay in Ludlow forever... and that's so okay, but for me personally I just knew that there was a bigger world out there," she told the BBC."Now that I'm here doing it, I just think it's mad, and I have never, ever taken this for granted."
Jasmine moved to London aged 18 to study at Bird College, an independent performing arts college, and met a lot of new people. Jasmine is a British-born Asian woman of two Chinese parents, and did not see many who looked like her growing up.Data from the 2011 census - which happened when Jasmine was about 13 - shows 98.3% of Ludlow's population was white, while 0.6% was Asian or Asian British."In terms of actual representation, I know no one from Ludlow or any of the sorts... as I've gotten older I've met people through different jobs or the industry as a whole," she said."There's been a lot more people who are actually from Shropshire, whether it be Shrewsbury, Bridgnorth... who are either East Asian, Southeast Asian, or black, mixed-race black. "I'm just like: 'This is crazy, we're all from Shropshire. Where have you been my whole life?'"
After graduating from Bird College in 2019 she landed her first professional job as Catherine of Aragon in Six The Musical on a Norwegian Breakaway cruise ship.Her next job was playing Ali in the Mamma Mia! UK Tour.Halfway through the tour, she was asked to be the third cover for the role of Sophie - the character played by Amanda Seyfried in the Hollywood film.Eventually, she had her day as Sophie, which Jasmine described as "such a special moment"."That year we had a mixed-race South Asian Sophie anyway on the tour, which already within itself is quite ground-breaking, because usually the Sophies... are white presenting," she said.
"The fact that the director was so accepting - it's just based off your talent."It is not how you look, it's a story at the end of the day, it's a made up story."She then clinched a role on the Hamilton UK Tour as a standby Schuyler sister, completing 91 shows in total.Then this year, she landed her first-ever West End job in Hamilton on London's West End.She plays Peggy Schuyler in act one and Maria Reynolds in act two, making her debut on 16 June."Transitioning between the tour and coming into West End is crazy," she said."I get to do it every single night - it's insane to me... I will never get over this at all."
'I'm here because I deserve to be'
"I am the only East Asian person on that stage," she said. "The fact that I can see people in the audience dotted around who are East Asian, who maybe have kids... and it's their first musical, I'm like: 'Oh, my god... this is absolutely insane'."She said she used to wonder if she had only got roles because of her ethnicity."Now I think: 'No, I'm here because I deserve to be here, and I'm talented enough to be here'."
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