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Jennifer Lawrence Boarding Adam McKay Theranos Medical Drama Project
EXCLUSIVE: Jennifer Lawrence is attaching herself to Adam McKay’s drama about medical company Theranos and its 32-year-old founder Elizabeth Holmes. Theranos is the blood-testing startup that once had Silicon Valley investors salivating over its commercial potential with a $9 billion valuation as recently as two years ago.
McKay, who did an outstanding job making the financial crisis understandable and enjoyable in The Big Short, feels like the perfect filmmaker for this rise-and-fall cautionary tale for a company that once could boast of Henry Kissinger on its board of directors. In Lawrence, he may have found the perfect leading lady to embody Holmes, at one point the latest poster child for medical innovation and potential profitability. Forbes has now revised the estimated net worth of the company to $800 million taking into account the $724 million of capital raised. Holmes and her Theranos execs have vigorously denied claims that the company’s tests are unreliable and have made statements that they are cooperating with the relevant authorities to resolve the issues.
As would be expected for Hollywood’s most in-demand leading lady, Lawrence has a bunch of projects in the pipeline. She is set to star as Fidel Castro’s young lover in Marita, a pitch Sony has acquired from American Hustle scribe Eric Warren Singer. The Oscar winner will play Marita Lorenz – the real-life femme fatale who romanced Castro, was involved in a plot to assassinate him, and even observed a conspiracy to kill JFK. Lawrence also has an untitled film directed by Darren Aronofsky in the works with Scott Franklin and Ari Handel of Protozoa producing. Paramount will release the film, about a couple whose relationship is tested when uninvited guests arrive at their home, disrupting their tranquil existence.
Lawrence also has Morten Tyldum’s Passengers in post opposite Chris Pratt. That pic follows a spacecraft traveling to a distant colony planet transporting thousands of people which has a malfunction in its sleep chambers. As a result, two passengers are awakened 60 years early. Early footage of the film is said to have wowed those in the audience.
McKay is a producer on Will Ferrell-Amy Poehler starrer The House, about a dad who convinces his friends to start an illegal casino in his basement after he and his wife spend their daughter’s college fund.
Mckay is repped by WME and Mosaic. Lawrence is repped by CAA.
The end is near. Over the course of six films, the X-Men have seen their share of intimidating opponents. But nothing has really prepared them (or audience members) for X-Men: Apocalypse, opening May 27 and the subject of four interconnected EW covers. The arrival of grumpy ancient mutant Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac) and his plan of worldwide destruction both rips apart and unites the X-Men, including young Jean Grey (Sophie Turner), Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), and Storm (Alexandra Shipp). “It’s kind of a conclusion of six films — X-Men 1, 2, 3, as well as First Class and Days of Future Past — and yet a potential rebirth of younger, newer characters,” says director Bryan Singer. “Even my father, who’s 85, called me and said, ‘Is this the last one?’ I said, ‘Well, it’s not going to be the last X-Men, I can promise you that, Dad.’ But it does have a kind of conclusive aspect to it.”
