It's been a heck of a couple of years for Tessa Thompson (and not just because she got to party with me at Sundance) who was the fiery center of the hilarious race comedy, Dear White People, had a solid turn in Selma, and is earning raves for her performance in Creed. Just as it seems she can't go any higher, Thompson looks to be joining one of the most anticipated films of next year, Alex Garland's Annihilation.
According to The Wrap, Thompson is in talks to join Natalie Portman and Jane the Virgin's Gina Rodriguez in the sci-fi film, Garland's follow-up to the acclaimed Ex Machina. The story is being adapted from Jeff VanderMeer's book and centers on four highly-skilled women taking on a dangerous mission where the laws of nature don’t apply.” The group consists of an anthropologist, a surveyor, a psychologist and a biologist. It's based on the first book in VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy so if it does well there could be franchise potential.
This is about as good of a trio of actresses as any director could hope for, and is all the more reason to be excited for what Garland has in store. He was able to get arguably Alicia Vikander's finest performance of 2015 in Ex Machina and there's every reason to think he can get even better from these ladies. Annihilation is expected to drop some time in 2017.
