Scarlett Johansson To Star In Movie About Female Gamer Harassment?


Scarlett Johansson is pretty busy these days with her commitments to the Avengers franchise, but rumor has it she’s very interested in a controversial role that takes on the gaming industry.

Johansson is one of several actresses who are reportedly taking a look at a project based on game developer Zoe Quinn’s upcoming memoir, Crash Override: How To Save The Internet From Itself. Deadline reported the following details about the project.

“The movie deal was based on a proposal titled Control Alt Delete, and tells the story of how Quinn, creator of the hip interactive game Depression Quest, was targeted by a digital mob bent on upending her life when a blog post by her ex-boyfriend went viral. It sparked the widely-discussed Gamergate controversy and took a surprising turn when instead of running, she decided to fight back. It is a very inside look at gaming and nerd culture and what happens when one gets caught in the gears of that machine.”

“Gaming and internet message boards used to be niche interests, mostly for young men,” says Quinn. “In the past few years, however, they’ve gone mainstream. Millions of people — including women and other marginalized people — have taken an interest in the platforms, image boards, and discussion forums that once belonged by default to a much smaller population. Most gamers give zero f***s about this. Like the rest of us, they’re just here to play games. But a vocal minority are clinging onto the brand of Cheetos-and-Mountain-Dew exclusionary identity ‘hardcore gamer,’ muttering ‘f***in casuals’ under their breath.”

While the project is still in early stages and no one has been cast yet, Johansson is reportedly extremely interested in portraying Quinn. The film is due out next year.

Meanwhile, Scarlett Johansson made headlines this week when it was reported that she earned a massive pay raise for Avengers: Age Of Ultron, making her the second-highest paid actor on the film behind Robert Downey Jr. The news comes after several celebrities began opening up about the wage gap this year, including Jennifer Lawrence, who said that being a female in the industry often meant weighing the decision to either speak up or be seen as “difficult.” In an essay for Lena Dunham’s newsletter Lenny, Lawrence wrote that during her negotiations for American Hustle she balked at speaking up about what she wanted, then questioned why she didn’t. Lawrence wrote the following.

“If I’m honest with myself, I would be lying if I didn’t say there was an element of wanting to be liked that influenced my decision to close the deal without a real fight. I didn’t want to seem ‘difficult’ or ‘spoiled.’ Based on the statistics, I don’t think I’m the only woman with this issue. Are we socially conditioned to behave this way? Could there still be a lingering habit of trying to express our opinions in a certain way that doesn’t ‘offend’ or ‘scare’ men?”

Scarlett Johansson reportedly jumped from about $5 million for the first Avengers film to $20 million for Age Of Ultron, which prompts the question of whether there will be a movie dedicated just to the Black Widow character sometime soon. Johansson told reporters at the premiere of Captain America: Winter Soldier that she’d like to see it happen and would be talking to the studios about it.

“If you want to see a Black Widow spin-off movie, then I want to see it. We’ll see. We will put the request into Marvel tomorrow,” Scarlett said.

[Photo by Anthony Harvey/Getty Images]

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