Naomi Ackie Lands Whitney Houston Role In Sony TriStar and Stella Meghie’s ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’

Deadline is reporting that BAFTA winner and Star Wars Rise of Skywalker star Naomi Ackie has nabbed the role of Whitney Houston in Sony/Tri-Star’s I Wanna Dance With Somebody which is set to be directed by Stella Meghie.

The pic, which is being made with the blessing of the Houston estate, is being written by Oscar nominee Anthony McCarten.

The film is being produced by McCarten’s Muse of Fire Productions, Pat Houston (the 2018 Kevin Macdonald documentary Whitney) on behalf of the Houston Estate, Grammy-winning music producer Clive Davis, Larry Mestel on behalf of Primary Wave Music, and Denis O’Sullivan (Bohemian Rhapsody) and Jeff Kalligheri (Submergence), who are also financing via Compelling Pictures. Primary Wave Music is a partner of the Whitney Houston estate. The key with this Houston project is that the estate has signed off on the screenplay, which grants the film to reproduce all the Houston hits. Such was key with getting Bohemian Rhapsody off the ground. Lifetime’s Whitney TV movie directed by Angela Bassett didn’t have consent of the Houston estate and thus was not able to reproduce all the hit singles in the multi-award winning singer’s canon.

Ackie won a BAFTA for her role of ‘Bonnie’ in the second series of Netflix’s cult series The End Of The F***Ing World. She also won a British Independent Film Award for ‘Most Promising Newcomer’ in 2017 for her performance as ‘Anna’ in Lady Macbeth. Last year, she played ‘Jannah’ in Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker, the final instalment in the Skywalker saga, and she was just recently seen in Education, part four of Steve McQueen’s acclaimed anthology series Small Axe. She will next take on a leading role in heist musical The Score with Will Poulter and Johnny Flynn.