Emma Thompson to Lead Climate Change Satire EXTINCTION

Variety reports that Emma Thompson will lead "Extinction," a satirical short film that includes footage of the Extinction Rebellion's continuing action in London. Thompson has been involved in such protests.

Thompson plays a veteran environmentalist and a highly qualified member of Extinction Rebellion who secures a meeting with a senior government official. She and the Conservative Party lawmaker lock horns as protests and disruption take place outside.

"We knew that this issue was very much in her wheelhouse and that she was in support of Extinction Rebellion," director Jack Cooper Stimpson said. "The character she's playing was written for her, so we sent her the script and got a very quick and resounding response of 'Yes, I'm in, I've even got the costume.'"

Tom Glynn-Carney ("Dunkirk") will play Thompson's son. Charlotte Hamblin ("Downton Abbey"), Nicholas Row ("Riviera"), Francis Magee ("Rogue One: A Star Wars Story"), Will Brown ("Unforgotten"), Gary Beadle ("Summer of Rockets"), and Rakhee Thakrar (Eastenders") make up the rest of the cast.

Actor and director Stimpson ("World on Fire") wrote the short film with Sam Haygarth.

"Both Sam and I are huge fans of the long-standing comedy of manners and political comedies that have been a huge part of the television landscape in Britain for the past few decades," Stimpson said. "We're pushing that genre a little further, and although this is very much a comedy, we hope that the documentary-style footage we have for the protest scenes will make this a genre-hopping type of project."

The film will be released by the end of May or early June.

The filmmakers are not making the project for Extinction Rebellion, but they said it has their blessing and is being made in solidarity with the group.

Read the original story on Variety.

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