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*Zendaya is set to produce and star in a thriller based on Anita Hemmings, the first black woman Vassar grad who passed for white to attend the university.
According to Deadline, the film is called “A White Lie” and it is an adaptation of the Karin Tanabe novel, “The Gilded Years.”
The novel, a psychological thriller, “built around the true story of Anita Hemmings, a light-skinned African American woman. She is the daughter of a janitor, who passed as white so she could attend Vassar at the turn of the century.” Hemmings is treated as a wealthy and educated white woman and sparks a romance with a rich Harvard student.
The Spider-Man: Homecoming star will play Hemmings. She will also produce the film, along with Reese Witherspoon and Lauren Neustadter through Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine.
Zendaya can be seen next in The Greatest Showman with Michelle Williams, Hugh Jackman and Zac Efron.
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James Earl Jones has been tapped along with newcomer Shane Paul McGhie to star in the indie drama, Foster Boy — based on true events.
Attorney-turned-screenwriter-and-producer Jay Paul Deratany wrote the script based on his experiences as a top litigator in Chicago.
Matthew Modine will star in the story that centers on a trial in which “a for-profit corporation, contracted by the state to provide foster children safe homes, instead places a known sex offender into the same home as the young client, with catastrophic results. An edge-of-the-seat legal struggle finally brings justice to the young man,” per ShadowandAct.
The site notes that: “One of the film’s producers, Peter Samuelson is the co-founder of First Star, which is at the forefront of addressing the foster care crisis. First Star Academies house, educate and encourage high school-age foster youth on 13 university campuses, where they also build a sense of community that is missing in their lives. Currently, 91 percent go on to colleges and universities.”
“There are an estimated 400,000 children in foster care in America,” Deratany said. “They are basically unrepresented, with few ways to shape their destinies. Why? One simple reason: they are children. They have no money and they have no voice.”
“Foster children are the last great civil rights victims in America,” Samuelson added. “After 25 years, I thought I had retired from producing, but Jay’s script was too compelling and too important.”
Modine will play litigator Michael Trainer in the pic, Jones plays the judge in the trial and McGhie is the young defendant, Jamal.
Foster Boy is directed by Youssef Delara and the production partnered Children’s Rights of New York, the Children’s Advocacy Institute at the University of San Diego, and First Star of Los Angeles, as expert advisers on the story.
