William Shakespeare is going through a gender transformation thanks to Julie Taymor. The director of Across The Universe and Frida (and the brains behind the upcoming Spider-Man: The Musical) is adapting The Tempest for her next trick and she's turning Prospero into a ladeee.
The Hollywood Reporter says Taymor has cast Helen Mirren in the lead role of "Prospera" for her second stab at directing The Bard's stormy tale (she filmed The Tempest once already in 1986 and also made Titus - based on Titus Andronicus - in 1999).
Mirren will play the exiled duchess-turned-sorcerer, alongside the likes of Jeremy Irons, Djimon Hounsou, Russell Brand, Alfred Molina, Ben Whishaw and Felicity Jones.
The Miramax release, which is due to start filming in Hawaii in November, will centre around Prospera, her daughter Miranda (Jones), a shipwrecked crew and a bunch of magical sorts (including Hounsou's deformed slave Caliban and Whishaw's airy spirit Ariel).
Among the unlucky shipwreckees are Brand's jester Trinculo, Irons' King of Naples and Molina's drunken butler Stephano.