Romola Garai is stepping behind the camera again. Best known for her roles in period dramas such as “Suffragette,” “The Hour,” and “Emma,” the actress is set to make her feature directorial debut with a horror pic, “Outside.” Deadline reports that Carla Juri (“Blade Runner 2049”), Imelda Staunton (“Vera Drake”), and Alec Secareanu (“God’s Own Country”) have signed on to star.
Slated to go into production this fall, “Outside” follows a young refugee “traumatized by war who is brought to a dilapidated house in order to care for a woman and her dying mother. Falling in love with the younger woman, he begins to suspect she is enslaved to a demon and resolves to fight the creature and rescue the woman he loves … but all is not what it seems.”
Garai penned the script. The project will be introduced to buyers in Cannes, and deals “have already closed in German-speaking Europe (Ascot Elite), Latin America (Imagem), and The Middle East (Front Row),” the source details.
“Outside” doesn’t mark Garai’s first directing credit. She previously helmed 2012’s “Scrubber,” a short about a mom looking to escape her daily routine that screened at Sundance and Edinburgh International Film Festival.
A two-time Golden Globe nominee, Garai snagged nods for her performances in BBC’s “Emma” and “The Hour.” She’s set to return to the small screen behind the scenes. Garai and “How I Live Now” scribe Penelope Skinner co-created futuristic drama “The Divide,” which Deadline notes has been optioned by Kudos. A pilot has also been commissioned.
Garai filmed her first studio pic, 2004’s “Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights,” when she was 17 years old. She later revealed that she was forced to stand in her underwear while a female producer appraised her body. The woman pointed at the teen’s thighs and told her, “This isn’t good enough.” Garai was weighed in and out every day of production and a dietitian was flown to the set in Puerto Rico to ensure she stayed underweight. “It screwed me up for years,” Garai revealed. “Not only did it completely change how I felt about my body, but I felt like I’d failed because I hadn’t fought back. I felt complicit, because I didn’t say no. I signed off on Photoshopped images and felt terrible for perpetrating this … lie.” She offered this experience as further proof of the entertainment industry’s “clear agenda of ensuring women’s relationships with their reflection on-screen make them feel inadequate.”
Other actresses with feature directorial debuts on the way include Patricia Arquette, Kristin Scott Thomas, and Rachel Griffiths.
