Emma Roberts is the latest addition to the ensemble cast of Sony Pictures’ Madame Web starring Dakota Johnson. Also on board are Sydney Sweeney, Celeste O’Connor, Isabela Merced and Tahar Rahim for director S.J. Clarkson. Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless penned the screenplay, with Kerem Sanga writing a previous draft.

Sony had no comment on Roberts’ casting Monday.

In the comics, Madame Web is depicted as an elderly woman with myasthenia gravis and thus was connected to a life-support system that looked like a spider web. Due to her age and medical condition, Madame Web never actively fought any villains. For that reason, sources have stressed it’s possible the project could turn into something else. Insiders say that due to her psychic sensory powers, she is essentially Sony’s version of Doctor Strange. Roberts’ role in the film in unknown.

Sony is coming off a hot streak with Venom: Let There Be Carnage making more than $500 million worldwide, while Spider-Man: No Way Home was the biggest film of 2021 with $1.85 billion in worldwide sales.

For Roberts, this will mark her first Marvel pic after recently wrapping production on the upcoming rom-com Maybe I Do, which also stars Diane Keaton, Susan Sarandon and Richard Gere. She also continues to be a go-to for new seasons of American Horror Story, most recently appearing in American Horror Story: 1984.

Roberts has also been active on the producing front as she is working on developing projects she isn’t necessarily starring in. One of her biggest producing credits is on the Netflix series First Kill.

She is repped by CAA and manager David Sweeney.

Sources