The Hate U Give star will be joining the cast of Universal’s movie adaptation of Dear Evan Hansen.
Amandla Stenberg’s set to play a high school senior, Alana, a role that has been expanded from the stage production. Alana is very active on social media and has a bubbly disposition, which only masks her isolation and loneliness. Her response to her classmate’s death starts a movement.
Sternberg will also perform an original song in the film which she’s writing with the show’s lyricists, Benj Pasek and Justin Paul.
The Tony Award-winning musical opened on Broadway in 2016 and it’s about a high school student with social anxiety who gets tied up in a lie after the family of a classmate who committed suicide thinks one of Hansens’ letters was their son’s suicide note.
Also cast in the film adaptation of Dear Evan Hansen is Kaitlyn Dever, who will play Zoe, the girl who starts dating Hansen after he begins a relationship with the classmate’s family. Ben Platt, who played Evan Hansen in the original, is expected to reprise his role. He won a Tony for his performance.
