Verity is as much the story of its namesake as it is about the people pulled into her unsettling world.
In the film adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s sensual psychological thriller, celebrated author Verity Crawford (Anne Hathaway) hires struggling writer Lowen Ashleigh (Dakota Johnson) to ghostwrite her upcoming novels. But what begins as a career opportunity soon takes a disturbing turn.
While staying at the Crawford family home with an unresponsive Verity, her husband Jeremy (Josh Hartnett), and their son Crew (Brady Wagner), Lowen begins uncovering troubling secrets that challenge everything she thought she knew about the family.
Watch the trailer:
Dakota Johnson steps into Lowen Ashleigh’s complicated world
After finding the perfect Verity in Anne Hathaway, the filmmakers turned their attention to Lowen, a writer who has struggled to find success with her published work while dealing with the recent loss of her mother to cancer.
They found their Lowen in Dakota Johnson.
Lowen is an extremely complicated, grieving, confused, sort of lost but brilliant person, Johnson explains.
For the actress, Lowen’s complicated personality offered plenty of compelling material to explore.
She ends up getting involved in this family and their web of secrets and lies and truths like a moth to the flame.” Johnson says. “She’s got a pretty traumatic past. She means well and is trying to succeed in being an author, but she’s also in a vulnerable place that starts to impact her judgment.
That vulnerability becomes increasingly important as Lowen gets closer to the Crawfords. With secrets slowly surfacing and the line between truth and deception becoming harder to distinguish, her stay in the family home becomes anything but ordinary.
Anne Hathaway praises Johnson’s mysterious performance
Hathaway was equally thrilled to perform alongside Johnson, recalling how impressed she was by her co-star during filming.
To listen to the musicality of the language, it was genuinely thrilling. I loved it so much and I love what she’s doing in this performance, Hathaway says.
Dakota connects so deeply in an emotional way with every beat. She has that thing where you can see thoughts just flit across her face, but she also is really mysterious at the same time. That combination of emotional transparency and the mystery that she brings in, it’s an unbelievable combination. I wish we had more scenes together.
It is that balance between vulnerability and mystery that makes Johnson an intriguing fit for Lowen, a character caught in an increasingly tangled web of desire, grief, suspicion, and buried truths.
Michael Showalter finds his ideal Lowen
Director Michael Showalter had long wanted to collaborate with Johnson, and Verity finally provided the opportunity.
I love Dakota and have always wanted to work with her,” says Showalter. “She has such a unique onscreen presence and an aura. This part is really perfect for her.
Despite the film’s dark and psychologically charged material, Josh Hartnett says working with Johnson behind the scenes was an enjoyable experience.
She is showing a side of herself in this film that I don’t think people have seen before,” says Hartnett. “Both of the actresses who I work with in Verity are phenomenal presences on screen.
Dakota is so charming, she makes you feel so at home when you’re working with her. We had a really good time doing our scenes together. It’s nice to work on a film where genuinely everybody is there to do a good job and are also really good people.
Colleen Hoover gives Dakota Johnson her seal of approval
For Verity author Colleen Hoover, Johnson’s casting was an immediate yes.
I’m such a big fan of hers. I am friends with E.L. James and so when they put her in that role for 50 Shades of Grey, I feel like I got to follow along with her rise and her career as a fan first, Hoover says.
And then when they cast her in this, she’s the perfect Lowen for me. She embodies everything that I was hoping an actress could bring to that role and she’s just so effortlessly gorgeous on screen and in person and so kind.
With Johnson stepping into one of Hoover’s most psychologically complex characters, Verity brings its seductive mix of mystery, obsession, secrets, and shifting truths to the big screen.
Just how much of what Lowen discovers can be trusted?
The mystery grows when Verity arrives in Philippine cinemas on September 30. Distributed locally by Columbia Pictures PH.
