Outlander star Maria Doyle Kennedy is set to star in the Untitled Granny Lee Film, a defiant queer drama inspired by a real-life 1980s transgender icon and directed by Ian Gabriel and Gabe Gabriel.

The Irish actress and singer, who plays Jocasta Cameron in the Starz drama, is also known for playing Queen Katherine of Aragon in The Tudors, Vera Bates in Downton Abbey, and Mrs. S in Orphan Black. Her film credits include The Commitments, Sing Street, Albert Nobbs, The Conjuring 2 and Wolfwalkers. 

Doyle Kennedy in the Canada-South Africa-Ireland co-production will perform the role of Irene, an estranged mother who seeks forgiveness from Lee, a stubborn trans disco queen played by gender activist Simone Heradien. “The world feels very precariously balanced right now, it is the time to acknowledge the wrongs of the past in order not to carry them into the future,” Doyle Kennedy said in a statement.

The film’s titular character is based on Granny Lee, a white-passing transgender performer who dominated the underground LGBTIQ+ disco scene in 1980s South Africa during the Apartheid era. “For me, this film is not only my big screen debut, but a deeply personal celebration of trans visibility, legacy, and love. Stepping into this role honors the resilience, glamour, and defiance of LGBTIQ+ lives sought at times to be erased from history,” Heradien added in her own statement.

The ensemble cast includes Quebec actor Paul Ahmarani, and South African performers Ntando Msi, Chioma Umeala, Will Chandler, Oliver Carnegie and Louw Venter. Cameras on the untitled queer drama are scheduled to roll in Cape Town from the end of May through to the end of June.

The film will be directed by the father-son team of Ian Gabriel and Gabe Gabriel, who earlier collaborated on the GLAAD Media Award-nominated film Runs in the Family, which streamed on worldwide in 2023. The screenplay for the Granny Lee project was penned by Gabe Gabriel, a transgender writer, director, and actor who was the lead writer on the Netflix TV series Mandala Murders and directed No Hiding Here, South Africa’s first gay romcom.

Ian Gabriel’s feature film credits include Death of a Whistleblower on Prime Video, and Four Corners, the South African entry for best international movie at  the 86th Academy Awards. The producer credits on the project are shared by Shant Joshi, Yanick Letourneau, Cindy Gabriel, Roelof Storm and Tamryn Reinecke. Alexandra Billings, Conor Barry and Doyle Kennedy are executive producing.