Mindy Kaling and Emma Thompson are joining forces. The actresses have signed on to star in an untitled movie centered on a late night talk show host, Variety reports. Kaling penned the script and will serve as one of the project’s producers.
“The story follows a venerated late-night talk show host, played by Thompson, who’s in danger of losing her long-running show right when she hires her first female writer, played by Kaling,” Variety writes. The comedy has been described as “The Devil Wears Prada” meets “Broadcast News.”
While a studio isn’t attached just yet, sources tell Variety that they anticipate a heated bidding war for the project.
This sounds like an amazing tag-team. Kaling launched on to the scene as a writer and actress on NBC’s “The Office” and created and stars in Hulu’s “The Mindy Project,” which she also writes for. This upcoming project will mark Kaling’s feature screenwriting debut. While Thompson is best known as an Oscar-winning actress, she too has major writing chops: in fact, she scored an Oscar in 1996 for adapting Jane Austen’s “Sense and Sensibility” for the big screen. She also won Best Actress at the Academy Awards for her performance in the film. Thompson took home her first acting Oscar in 1993 for “Howards End.”
Kaling and Thompson are both vets of the late-night circuit as guests. The in-demand talents have been very busy as of late. Kaling recently signed on to “Ocean’s Eight,” the all-female, star-studded “Ocean’s 11” reboot, and will play “Mrs. Who” in Ava DuVernay’s Disney film “A Wrinkle in Time.” In June she inked a multi-year deal with Universal TV. The fifth season of “The Mindy Project” debuts October 4. Thompson co-wrote and stars in “Bridget Jones’s Baby,” in theaters now. She’ll voice the character of Mrs. Potts in Disney’s upcoming live-action version of “Beauty and the Beast” starring Emma Watson, set to hit theaters in 2017.