Via The Hollywood Reporter |
Streep has lent her support to Feldman's film about Lilly Ledbetter and her fight for legislative change.
Meryl Streep has jumped aboard Rachel Feldman's Lilly Ledbetter fair pay movie, Lilly.
Streep has brought her backing to Feldman and fellow producers to bring the long-gestating feature based on the life of the equal pay icon to production. The Hollywood actress earlier lent her support to calls for equal pay for women in the U.S., including raising the issue while promoting her star turn in Suffragette, in which she played the iconic political activist Emmeline Pankhurst.
Feldman will direct Lilly, which earlier had the working title Ledbetter, as it portrays Ledbetter inspiring the Fair Pay Restoration Act, the first piece of legislation President Barack Obama signed after his inauguration. J. Todd Harris (The Kids Are All Right) has also joined Feldman as a producing partner on the project.
Ledbetter gained attention by fighting The Goodyear Tire Company for her right to pay equal to that of her male counterparts. She was a pioneer in putting a name to the issue, before Megan Rapinoe energized the fight for equal pay in sports and Michelle Williams spotlighted the pay gap for female actors in Hollywood.
"Historic dramas often chronicle the external forces of politics, but Lilly tells the story of what happens to a woman’s inner life when patriarchal injustice overwhelms every aspect of her existence. Lilly is the perfect film for this moment in time," Feldman, a director, screenwriter and activist and the former chair of the DGA Women’s Steering Committee, said in a statement.
Feldman is repped by Amy Retzinger/Evan Pioche at Verve,\ and Gregg Ramer at Paul Hastings.