News out of Variety reports that Oscar-nominated actress Michelle Williams is currently in talks to star as rocker Janis Joplin in Sean Durkin’s (Martha Marcy May Marlene) biopic Janis.
Not unfamiliar to biopics after her 2011 turn as Marilyn Monroe in My Week with Marilyn, Williams seems even more suited to this role, already sharing a baby-faced resemblance to the 1960s musician.
Janis Joplin rose to fame in the ’60s with Big Brother and the Holding Company before dying of a drug overdose in 1970 at the age of 27. Durkin’s film will be depicting the last 6 months of the rock-n-roll icon’s life. Peter Newman, who is producing the film, has long held rights to a great portion of Joplin’s catalog and written materials that will provide context for the story’s plot.
Williams is in the final reaches of another successful year, with the upcoming releases of Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women and Manchester By the Sea, for which she is receiving promising Oscar buzz. Williams recently wrapped on Todd Haynes’ Wonderstruck and is in rehearsals for The Greatest Showman, a musical also starring Hugh Jackman and Zac Efron.
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