Natalie Dormer, best known for her work in the Game of Thrones and The Hunger Games franchises, has been cast in the leading role of the new South African crime thriller series White Lies.

Set in the upscale suburbs of Bishopscourt in Cape Town, South Africa, White Lies will be both a murder mystery and an “urgent exploration of race and privilege, inequality and identity.” According to The Hollywood Reporter, Dormer will play Edie Hansen, an investigative journalist whose teenage nephews are accused of murdering her estranged brother. In the course of trying to ascertain the truth behind her brother’s death, Edie is forced to confront “the crumbling local police force, a corrupt political system, and the secretive world of extreme Cape wealth.”

Created by Sean Steinberg (The Girl from St. Agnes) and written by Darrel Bristow-Bovey (Rhythm City), White Lies will commence production in Cape Town on March 6. John Trengove will act as the series’ lead director. Trengove most recently helmed the upcoming thriller Manodrome with Jesse Eisenberg and Adrien Brody, which Collider‘s own Marco Vito Oddo praised as “a unique character study” that “explores how a society that holds inclusive values makes certain men dangerously frustrated.”

Who Else Is Involved in White Lies?

Additional directors set to work on the show include Thati Pele (Blood & Water, Savage Beauty), Catharine Cooke (Reyka, The River), and Christiaan Olwagen (Poppie Nongena, Kanarie). The show will co-star Brendon Daniels (Skemerdans, Four Corners) as a veteran detective who comes into conflict with Edie during the course of her investigation. Other cast members include Langley Kirkwood (The Mauritanian, Dredd), Morgan Santo (Raised by Wolves, The Watch), Jane de Wet (the 2021 Slumber Party Massacre remake), and Robert Hobbs (District 9, Invictus). The series is being produced by M-Net, Quizzical Pictures, and Fremantle as part of the first-look deal Dormer signed with the latter company in 2018.

Says Dormer of White Lies:

“I’m thrilled to be in Cape Town and begin this beautiful, gripping show. South Africa has so much to offer an international audience in its storytelling. I’m truly excited to bring Darrel’s eight episode page-turner to life with such a group of talented directors, led by John, and a superb ensemble cast.”

Dormer most recently starred in the Showtime series Penny Dreadful: City of Angels. She will next be seen as the lead in Audrey’s Children, a biopic about storied children’s oncologist (and Ronald McDonald House Charities co-founder) Dr. Audrey Evans, and opposite Naomie Harris (The Man Who Fell to Earth, Venom: Let There Be Carnage) in The Wasp, a psychological thriller based on Morgan Lloyd Malcolm‘s play of the same name.

via Collider