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Rihanna names ‘stunning’ indie darling she would cast to play her in a biopic

Pop superstar gushed over the actor, calling her ‘just gorgeous’

Inga Parkel
New York
Wednesday 12 June 2024 18:11 BST
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Is Rihanna really retiring from music?

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Rihanna already has her mind set on who she would cast to play her in a future biopic.

Speaking to E! News’s Justin Sylvester on 10 June at the launch of her Fenty Hair, the pop superstar, 36, was asked which actor she would love to see fill in for her in a movie.

Taylor [Russell],” Rihanna responded, gushing over the 29-year-old Canadian actor. “Because she’s got a nice forehead and she’s fly and I feel like I want to be her, so I want her to pretend to be me.

“I want people to see me in that light,” she added. “Just gorgeous, she’s stunning.”

Russell is perhaps best known for her starring role in Luca Guadagnino’s 2022 horror romance Bones and All, in which she starred opposite Timothée Chalamet.

She leads the movie as Maren, a young woman who embarks on a 1,000-mile road trip across America. Along the way, she meets and falls in love with a drifter (Chalamet).

Before that, she starred in other independent films, including 2020’s romance drama Words on a Bathroom Wall and mystery-thriller Before I Fall (2017).

‘Just gorgeous, she’s stunning,’ Rihanna gushed of Taylor Russell
‘Just gorgeous, she’s stunning,’ Rihanna gushed of Taylor Russell (Getty Images)

In 2019, Russell landed her breakthrough role in A24’s sports romance Waves. The critically acclaimed film follows the epic emotional journey of an African American family in the wake of an unexpected tragedy. It also starred This Is Us’s Sterling K Brown, Hamilton star Renée Elise Goldsberry, Euphoria breakout Alexa Demie and Kelvin Harrison Jr.

Russell made headlines last month after she and Harry Styles reportedly broke up. According to The Sun, a source said that the two decided to go their separate ways shortly after taking a trip together to Japan in April. The pair first sparked relationship rumors last summer.

Rihanna, meanwhile, told Entertainment Tonight that she’s “starting over” work on her long-awaited ninth album. “Music, for me, is a new discovery,” she said at her Fenty Hair launch. “I’m rediscovering things. I have been working on the album for so long that I kinda just put all that stuff aside. Now I’m prepared to go back in the studio. Now, I’m prepared. So I’m going to start...”

Asked if that means she is “starting over” her work on the album, she agreed: “Yeah, starting over, but I don’t want to neglect the songs that I have. I want to actually go back and listen to stuff with new ears, with my new perspective, and then see what applies and what I still am in love with.”

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