Emma Roberts is in a very important part of her career right now. After years of working as a child actress she is at a point where she needs to show that she can take adult characters and make them actually seem like adults. To do so it looks like she's going to go the Blake Lively route, playing a lead female role in a heist film set in a major Northeastern city.
Roberts has signed on for a part in Empire State, the new film from director Dito Montiel, according to Variety. The project is already set to star Liam Hemsworth as one of two childhoods friends who plan a job to rob an armored car depository. Dwayne Johnson is also attached to star as the NYPD detective hunting them down (think Jon Hamm's character in The Town). Roberts will play a waitress who may or may not be a love interest for Hemsworth's character. The story is actually based on a true story that occurred in 1982.The script was written by Adam Mazer, who previously wrote the 2007 thriller Breach as well as the made-for-TV-movie You Don't Know Jack with Al Pacino. Montiel most recently made The Son of No One, which premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and hit theaters last fall. Though the hunt is still on for the second lead actor, production is currently scheduled to begin this spring.
Roberts most recently completed work on the dramedy Celeste and Jesse Forever and is currently in production on Adult World, a coming of age drama starring John Cusack, Shannon Woodward, and Evan Peters.
cinemablend