Sigourney Weaver to Play Gypsy Rose Lee in HBO's "Gypsy and Me"

By Zachary Pincus-Roth
March 8, 2007

Sigourney Weaver will star as the famed burlesque artist Gypsy Rose Lee — whose life was turned into the musical Gypsy — in the HBO television movie "Gypsy and Me," Variety reports.

The playwright and screenwriter Martin Sherman (Bent, the book for The Boy From Oz) is adapting the script from the book "My G-String Mother: At Home and Backstage With Gypsy Rose Lee," written by Lee's son Erik Lee Preminger.

Weaver will executive produce the film with "Dreamgirls" producer Laurence Mark.

The film takes place in the late 1950s, when Lee was at the tail end of her striptease career and when she wrote her memoir that inspired Gypsy.

Weaver has starred in Hurlyburly (Tony nomination) and Sex and Longing on Broadway and Gemini, Mrs. Farnsworth, The Mercy Seat and The Guys Off-Broadway.

Her films include the "Alien" series, the "Ghostbusters" films, "Gorillas in the Mist" (Oscar nomination) and "Working Girl" (Oscar nomination). She is planning to re-team with "Aliens" director James Cameron on his next film, "Avatar."