Amandla Stenberg to play Alana Beck in Dear Evan Hansen film adaptation

Amandla Stenberg, the 21 year old actress and singer, has joined the cast of the upcoming Universal Pictures film adaptation of the stage production ‘Dear Evan Hansen’.

The stage production has been the winner of six Tony Awards including Best Musical. Dear Evan Hansen is an inspirational story about a teenager with social anxiety who gets caught up in a lie when the family of a classmate who committed suicide confuses one of Evan’s letters for his suicide note.

It is being reported that Stenberg will be singing a new original song for the film, with Stenberg writing the song with Benj Pasek and Justin Paul who were the original music writers for the Broadway production.

The Hate U Give star will play Alana, a high school senior whose cheery facade and social-media savvy mask a deeper loneliness and isolation, and whose response to the death of a classmate ignites a movement.

Stenberg made her debut in acting in the film Colombiana in 2011 before making her breakthrough role as Rue in the cult following series The Hunger Games.

Although it is yet to be confirmed whether Ben Platt will reprise his role as Evan for the big screen, he has publicly mentioned his ‘love’ to reprise the title role. Kaitlyn Dever is rumoured to be cast as the female lead Zoe Murphy, however this has yet to be confirmed.

Steven Levenson, who wrote the book for the original stage production, is set to write the script for the movie and executive produce alongside Pasek and Paul. Stephen Chbosky is set to direct the film adaptation with Marc Platt and Adam Siegel producing.