2017 just keeps getting better for Elisabeth Moss.
For years, fans of Elisabeth Moss have been waiting for her to get her due. But they’ve finally been vindicated. The indignation over Moss’ lack of Emmy wins as Peggy Olson in Mad Men can be eased now that she’s picked up the award for Outstanding Lead Actress this past Sunday for her work on The Handmaid’s Tale. Her repertoire of powerful onscreen women looks set to develop further with her latest project. Moss has been cast as the lead in Call Jane, with Simon Curtis (My Week With Marilyn) serving as director.
The film will be based on the real-life women’s movement called the Jane Collective, an underground network of suburban women providing safe abortions for women before the provisions of Roe v Wade. Moss’ is slated to play the eponymous protagonist, who unexpectedly becomes pregnant and comes across the group in her time of need. Hayley Schore and Roshan Sethi — both with credits on CBS’ Code Black — will write the indie picture. Producer Robbie Brenner assures that Schore and Sethi’s script is both “commercial and entertaining, but it’s also really relevant to what is going on with the world today.” In a sea of either extraordinarily commercial blockbuster fare or far more politically-charged films, there is hope that Call Jane will hit that sweet spot that audiences are increasingly after.
Moss is showing no signs of slowing down anyway, and her appeal is extremely broad considering her penchant for a wide range of female characters. Coming off the high of her Emmy win, she continues to practically build a brand around playing complicated, nuanced women onscreen, commanding the screen through vulnerability. Mad Men and The Handmaid’s Tale may remain her most salient works for a good while, but there’s also Jane Campion’s mystery drama, Top of the Lake, to contend with. Earlier this year, Moss also landed another starring role on TV — in typhoid fever miniseries Fever. Moss has also been known to take roles in unconventional films, some examples being Ben Wheatley’s dystopian drama High-Rise and her upcoming role in Ruben Östlund’s satirical drama, The Square.
Moss’ work behind the scenes has brought us some of the best TV we’ve seen in ages. Along with her coveted acting trophy, she took home the award for Outstanding Drama Series for The Handmaid’s Tale due to her producer credit on the show. Being also slated to executive produce Fever with Annapurna Television and BBC America, Moss’ projects not only bring complex women to the screen generally. They also reveal a sense of timeliness in a political climate that seeks to control women’s choices.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Call Jane is projected to start production in the first quarter of 2018.