Priyanka Chopra made a wild announcement on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” Wednesday.
The “Quantico” actress said she is developing a film adaptation of the 2018 Netflix documentary “Wild Wild Country,” about the Rajneesh cult, which built a commune in rural Oregon in the 1980s. The Emmy-winning six-part series details the conflict between the nirvana-seeking cult and the conservative small town it neighbored, which was spurred viciously by Ma Anand Sheela, a charismatic, highly influential, foul-mouthed and polarizing assistant of the cult’s leader, the Indian guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (also known as Osho).
Chopra, 36, revealed that she will star in and produce the adaptation and is partnering with director Barry Levinson (“Rain Man,” “Wag the Dog”) for the project.
“We’re developing it as the character of Sheela, who was this guru who originated from India, [Osho’s] right-hand woman. And she was just devious and created a whole cult in America, brought people here,” Chopra told DeGeneres. “[The documentary] was amazing, and I’m developing that next for me to star in and produce, which I think would be really cool.”
Chopra didn’t say on the show that she would be playing Sheela — clearly the most fascinating character in the documentary — but one of her representatives later confirmed that for HuffPost.
This story has been updated to include a comment from Priyanka Chopra’s representative.