Star Wars: The Force Awakens actress Daisy Ridley has put yet another project on her growing schedule, signing on to star in A Woman of No Importance. Per Deadline, this isn’t an adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s play, but rather an adaptation of Sonia Purnell’s biography of Virginia Hall, an American heiress and spy.
Before World War II, Hall tried to join the ranks of the American Foreign Service but was denied due to her gender and her disability (she lost a leg in a hunting accident). When the war broke out, Hall was recruited by British intelligence’s SOE. Working in France and Spain, Hall helped coordinate the efforts of the French Resistance and was apparently considered by Germany’s Gestapo the Allies’ most dangerous spy. After the war she join the OSS, the precursor to the CIA, and was made an honorary Member of the Order of the British Empire.
A Woman of No Importance has yet to gain a director, but it will be produced by Paramount Pictures and J.J. Abrams under his Bad Robot banner. Meanwhile, Ridley is currently filming Kenneth Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express remake and can be seen in Star Wars: The Last Jedi this December.
Originally published January 25, 2017. Updated April 15, 2018.
