Liz Meriwether to write Britney Spears film

“New Girl” creator and “Dying for Sex” co-creator Liz Meriwether will pen the screenplay for Universal’s forthcoming Britney Spears biopic from director Jon M. Chu and producer Marc Platt.

The movie is based on Spears’ revealing memoir, “The Woman in Me.” Released in October 2023, the book sold 1.1 million copies in its first week. The audiobook — read by Academy Award-nominated actor Michelle Williams (who later starred in “Dying for Sex”), with an introduction by Spears — was the fastest-selling in Simon & Schuster’s history.

In August 2024, news broke that Universal Pictures landed the rights to the Grammy-winner‘s bestselling tome with “Wicked” director Chu and producer Platt attached to develop the feature. (Platt’s production company has a longstanding deal at Universal.) Spears shared news of the “secret project” herself, writing on social media that Platt has “always made my favorite movies” and telling her fans to “stay tuned” for more news.

Meriwether is a WGA winner for her work on the FX limited series “Dying for Sex,” which she co-created with Kim Rosenstock, and a PGA winner for the Hulu limited series “The Dropout,” about Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes’ rise and fall from grace. Meriwether also received four Primetime Emmy nominations for her work on the two series. But her breakthrough came in 2011 with the one-two punch of writing the screenplay for the popular rom-com “No Strings Attached,” starring Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher, and creating the classic Fox comedy, “New Girl,” starring Zooey Deschanel, which ran for seven seasons.

Page Six first reported news of Meriwether’s involvement in the project. Universal had no comment.

-Variety