Producer-turned-pop star Pharrell Williams and musicvideo-wizard-turned-feature filmmaker Michel Gondry are collaborating on a yet-untitled musical film based on Williams' childhood in the Virginia Beach area. Now, they've been joined by another of the area's most celebrated musical figures, with Variety reporting on April 30 that Missy Elliott has also signed on to the cast in an unspecified role.
According to Variety, the film is set in 1977, and based on Williams' experiences growing up in the area's Atlantis Apartments. The rest of the cast includes actor/R&B singer Halle Bailey, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Atlanta's Brian Tyree Henry and Da’Vine Joy Randolph, who recently won her first Oscar for The Holdovers.
Williams is a producer of the film, which is reportedly inspired by his youth in the Virginia Beach area.
While Williams and his partner Chad Hugo went from Virginia Beach high school bandmates to superstar producers in the 1990s and early 2000s (producing for, among others, fellow Virginia Beach denizens the Clipse), Elliott and Williams' cousin Timbaland formed a hugely successful partnership as producer-songwriters, with Elliott then stepping into the spotlight herself on 1997's Supa Dupa Fly. She went on to notch six platinum albums, with her singles "Work It" and "Lose Control" reaching No. 2 and No. 3, respectively, on the Billboard Hot 100.
Elliott's previous sporadic film and TV roles include voice parts in American Dad and Shark Tale, as well as a two-episode guest role on the Lee Daniels series Star.
Elliott announced her first ever headlining tour earlier this month.
Though her run as a chart-topping artist largely ended in the mid-2000s, Elliott announced her first headlining tour earlier this month. The Out of This World Tour will make 24 stops across North America between July and August this summer, with Ciara, Busta Rhymes and Elliott's longtime collaborator Timbaland as support acts.
“This is an incredible time in my life as I am experiencing so many milestone ‘firsts,’" Elliott said in a statement at the time. "Being the FIRST female Hip Hop artist to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and now going out on my FIRST headline tour. Fans have been asking me to tour forever but I wanted to wait until I felt the time was right because I knew if I was ever going to do it, I had to do it big, and I had to do it with family! So get ready to be taken OUT OF THIS WORLD with me, Busta Rhymes, Ciara, and Timbaland! We can’t wait to share this experience with the fans!”
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Elliott was the first female rapper to earn induction into both the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
A four-time Grammy-winner, Elliott has also received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and an honorary doctorate from the Berklee College of Music. In 2023, she became the first female hip-hop artist to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, several years after becoming the first female rapper to be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. In 2022, a street in Portsmouth, Virg., was renamed Missy Elliott Blvd. in her honor.
