Jacob Latimore has landed the role of Langston in Kasi Lemmons‘ helmed musical Black Nativity. The Milwaukee native will be paired opposite Oscar winner Forest Whitaker, Angela Bassett, and Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson.

Black Nativity will start production in late January 2013 with Fox Searchlight distributing the film.

Originally written by Langston Hughes as a re-telling of the Bible’s nativity story, ‘Black Nativity’ tells the story of a teenage boy named Langston from Baltimore who is sent by his single mother to Harlem to spend Christmas with the grandparents he’s never met. Through his grandfather’s Christmas Eve sermon, he learns about the importance of faith and family. Hudson will play the mother who hasn’t spoken to her father since they had a falling out after she got pregnant. Bassett and Whitaker will play the boy’s estranged grandparents, Rev. Clarence and Aretha Cobbs. Whitaker is expected to play multiple characters during the Nativity sequence.

Kasi Lemmons is writing and directing the film based on Langston Hughes’ gospel musical that was first performed on Broadway in 1961. Casting director Tracy ‘Twinkie’ Byrd is currently putting together the rest of the cast. Production will run from January to March 2013 in New York City.

Latimore co-starred in “Vanishing on 7th Street,” a post-apocalyptic film starring Hayden Christensen, Thandie Newton and John Leguizamo. In the film, Latimore plays James Leary, a tough 12-year- old boy whose mother, along with nearly everyone else on Earth, has vanished into thin air, leaving him to fend for himself with several strangers who have barricaded themselves in a tavern. He also guest-starred on the BET series Read Between the Lines. -Black Film