Harry Styles Boards Olivia Wilde’s ‘Don’t Worry, Darling’
“Dunkirk” star Harry Styles has boarded the psychological thriller “Don’t Worry, Darling,” opposite Florence Pugh, Chris Pine and Olivia Wilde.
Styles replaces Shia LaBeouf, who has departed the project due to a scheduling conflict. Wilde is directing “Don’t Worry, Darling,” which is set in an isolated community in the California desert in the 1950s, from a screenplay by Katie Silberman.
New Line is planning a fall production start. Wilde is also a producer on “Don’t Worry Darling” along with Silberman and Vertigo Entertainment’s Roy Lee and Miri Yoon.
New Line bought “Don’t Worry, Darling” in August, 2019, after 18 bids were submitted for the project with Wilde and Silberman attached. That deal came on the heels of Wilde’s acclaimed directorial debut “Booksmart,” a coming-of-age comedy about two best friends who cut loose on their last day of high school.
Silberman, one of the writers on “Booksmart,” wrote the screenplay for “Don’t Worry, Darling,” based on a spec script by Shane and Carey Van Dyke. Catherine Hardwicke will executive produce alongside the Van Dykes. The project is being overseen by studio execs Richard Brener, Daria Cercek and Celia Khong.
Wilde won the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Feature for “Booksmart.” She is set to direct an upcoming Marvel project and will direct and executive produce the Searchlight feature “Perfect.”
Styles, who was a music star with the band One Direction, made his acting debut in Christopher Nolan’s “Dunkirk.” Nolan told journalists that he had cast Styles because “he has an old-fashioned face … the kind of face that makes you believe he could have been alive in that period.”
Styles is repped by CAA and Full Stop Management. The news was first reported by Deadline Hollywood.
More from Variety
Best of Variety
Sign up for Variety’s Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
