Margaret Qualley and Sabrina Carpenter join Tom Holland in Fred Astaire biopic

Tom Holland first told GQ in 2021 that he was attached to play Fred Astaire in a feature biopic. Nearly five years later, the project has its two female leads. Margaret Qualley and Sabrina Carpenter have joined the untitled Sony Pictures film, with Qualley cast as Adele Astaire and Carpenter as Ginger Rogers, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Deadline first reported the news.

Paul King, the filmmaker behind Paddington and Wonka, is directing from a script he co-wrote with Steven Levenson, based on Kathleen Riley's book The Astaires: Fred & Adele. Amy Pascal and Rachel O'Connor produce for Pascal Pictures, alongside Ben Holden and Josh Hyams for Lightbulb Pictures and Holland for his Billy17 banner.

In a statement, King said the film would center on Astaire's partnership with his sister Adele, a Broadway and West End star whose dancing was never captured on film. "Fred left a timeless legacy of dance on film, most famously in his collaborations with Ginger Rogers, while Adele's work has been lost to history; indeed, no footage of her dancing survives," King said, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "The cinematic challenge of bringing to life these icons of the twentieth century is one that I could not imagine without Tom Holland, Margaret Qualley and Sabrina Carpenter by my side."

Carpenter and Qualley have already shared the screen this year in the music video for Carpenter's "House Tour," a single from her album Man's Best Friend, according to Billboard. Carpenter, a two-time Grammy winner, began her career as an actress on the Disney Channel series Girl Meets World. Qualley earned Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for her work in Maid and The Substance.

The Astaire family has endorsed the project. Fred Astaire's daughter, Ava Astaire McKenzie, said in a statement that "with Kathleen Riley's seminal biography as its foundation, and the creative team in place, the story of their partnership both on and off the stage is in the best care," according to The Hollywood Reporter. Her son, Tyler McKenzie, is consulting on the film and serves as a co-producer.

Holland, who spent the summer starring in Spider-Man: Brand New Day and The Odyssey, has said he intends to perform all of the dancing himself. "I have a desire to use no doubles, to do all of the dancing, to shoot those dances in one shot, how he would have done it," Holland said, according to Yahoo News. Sony has not announced a release date for the film.