Movies
‘The Housemaid’ – Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried to Star in Paul Feig’s Thriller for Lionsgate
Director Paul Feig is helming an adaptation of bestselling novel The Housemaid, and the Lionsgate thriller has found its leads in Immaculate star Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried (Things Heard & Seen, Mamma Mia).
The screenplay is by “The Boys” scribe Rebecca Sonnenshine, based on the hit novel by Freida McFadden.
In the film, “Millie (Sweeney), a struggling young woman who is relieved to get a fresh start as a housemaid to Nina (Seyfried) and Andrew, an upscale, wealthy couple… but soon learns that the family’s secrets are far more dangerous than her own.”
“I’m thrilled to have The Housemaid join our upcoming slate. A great filmmaker and a great cast with a great script from a great book is a terrific place to start. My prior work experiences with Paul and Amanda have been nothing short of spectacular, and Sydney is as talented and compelling as can be,” said Adam Fogelson, chair, Lionsgate Motion Picture Group.
Erin Westerman, co-president of the Lionsgate Motion Picture Group, added, “The Housemaid is a certified phenomenon with over a year on the New York Times Bestsellers list, millions of copies sold, and a place on numerous critics’ choice lists. Part of the fun of the book was imagining the cast while we read it, and Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried are perfect for Millie and Nina – they’re both mysterious, nuanced, and incredibly skilled at becoming characters who don’t reveal everything right away. We’re thrilled to team them with Paul Feig, who we worked with on A Simple Favor and its upcoming sequel, and has a proven track record of developing stories with dynamic female leads.”
McFadden’s novel has been on the New York Times bestseller list for more than a year, 75 weeks and counting, and on the Amazon bestsellers list for 98 weeks and counting.
Hidden Pictures’ Todd Lieberman will produce. Carly Kleinbart Elter will oversee the project for Hidden Pictures. Feigco’s Paul Feig and Laura Fischer are also producing. Sweeney and Seyfried will serve as executive producers alongside Alex Young and McFadden.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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