According to Deadline, The Last of Us star Bella Ramsey has been cast for the leading role in the upcoming biographical drama titled Girl Next Door, which will be inspired by a true story.
Ramsey will be playing British terrorist Samantha or Sherafiyah Lewthwaite, who gained the nickname of the White Widow after being accused of killing more than 400 people. She is the widow of 19-year-old terrorist Germaine Lindsay, who was one of the four suicide bombers during the 7/7 London Underground bombing incident in 2005, which took the lives of 53 innocent people. Lewthwaite is currently one of the West’s most wanted terrorism suspects.
At the moment, Ramsey is currently in production for HBO’s long-awaited The Last of Us Season 2, where they’ll be reprising the role of Ellie. Besides the Girl Next Door, Ramsey was also recently cast in the coming-of-age comedy Sunny Dancer and in the thriller drama Harmonia.
Who’s involved in Girl Next Door?
Girl Next Door will be written and directed by Bruce Goodison (Black Cab). It will be produced by Kate Cook, Julia Berg, Andee Ryder, and Sofia Ismail Martin, with Nicola Pearcey, Thierry Wase-Bailey, and Henriette Wollmann serving as executive producers. It hails from Celsius Entertainment. Production is expected to begin later this year in October.
“This film is about a young life-affirming idealist with a broken heart. Sam turns her grief into a strength that was then exploited by men for purposes of global terror. I just didn’t believe the hype – was Sam really the terrorist mastermind the press and anti-terror police would have us believe, or was there another truth? Her truth. I’ve written an unsettling mystery that asks how it might feel if the person you love and expect to share a life with goes out one day and commits an act of terror that challenges everything you hold dear. Sam goes on an odyssey that both consumes her and alters her. Little by little, she is isolated and radicalized, and it could be argued this was as a result of being rejected by us,” Goodison said in a statement.
“A lot of my work is research-based, and in preparation for this film, I have had access to Sam’s personal diary that she started to write after the bombing, I spoke to family members and the ‘adopted’ family that inspired her Muslim conversion, Nikki, the other woman, ‘Sheikh’ Faisal, the security services, plus the Sun journalist who she denounced Germaine’s actions to. The film is unapologetically from Sam’s perspective – anyone playing Sam needs to be fearless. Bella Ramsey is the perfect fit. Bella will bring heart, life, and complexity to this role.”
