After receiving an Oscar nomination for her role in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and having what could be considered a banner year in 2013 — which included starring roles in both Ain’t Them Bodies Saints and Side Effects and a supporting role in Her — Rooney Mara has quickly become one of the most highly sought-after actresses working right now, and for good reason.
Today The Hollywood Reporter notes The Weinstein Co. has successfully reeled in Mara for a role in the Indian survival tale Lion, which the studio acquired for distribution at last year’s Cannes Film Festival. Mara joins a cast that includes Nicole Kidman, Dev Patel, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Tannishtha Chatterjee, David Wenham, and Divian Ladwa.
The film, which is being produced by See-Saw Films and directed by Garth Davis (“Top of the Lake“) from a screenplay by Luke Davies, tells the true story of five-year-old Saroo Brierley, who boards the wrong train in rural India and winds up far away from home on the streets of Kolkata. The boy is taken in by an adoption agency and eventually finds a new home in Australia, but 25 years later he sets out to find his family. Lion is adapted from Brierley’s book “A Long Way Home“.
