Pop/R&B artist Rihanna has evidently joined the cast of Peter Berg’s imminently in-production board game adaptation, “Battleship.”
The singer joins Taylor Kitsch and Alexander Skarsgard as the female lead in the story of an international naval fleet coming together to battle a water-bound armada of otherworldly origin that’s reported to simply be an alien invasion. Kitsch will play the wild, spirited naval officer lead with Skarsgaard as his idolized brother, also an officer, but a more straight-and-narrow type of guy.
It’s definitely a head-scratching move considering her colorful, larger-than-life persona in the music world, and her lack of acting experience, but it will be fascinating to see how this develops throughout production. No word on specifically who she’ll play in the pic but — while her stylistic choices sometimes resembles an “otherworldly” character from a cheesy 50’s sci-fi film — we imagine she’ll likely grit it out as some sort of defense force officer, and end up being the female lead.
Also on Rihanna’s side is director Berg’s track record with casting — many of his young “Friday Night Lights” stars have since come along in leaps and bounds (Garrett Hedlund, Connie Britton, Amber Heard) and obviously fellow musician-turned-actor, country music star Tim McGraw, did a great job as the has-been father of Hedlund’s character.
“Battleship” is scheduled to hit theaters May 25th, 2012.