Jennifer Lawrence Will No Longer Play Elizabeth Holmes in Adam McKay’s ‘Bad Blood’ Because Amanda Seyfried Was “Terrific”

Jennifer Lawrence has backed out of playing Elizabeth Holmes in Adam McKay’s upcoming Bad Blood, following the success of Amanda Seyfried’s performance in The Dropout.

The news was revealed by Kyle Buchanan, who profiled Lawrence for The New York Times. He wrote on Twitter, “Jennifer Lawrence will no longer star as Elizabeth Holmes in Adam McKay’s Bad Blood, she told me. She came to that conclusion after watching Amanda Seyfried play Holmes in The Dropout: ‘I thought she was terrific. I was like, ‘Yeah, we don’t need to redo that.’ She did it.���”

McKay’s film was first announced in 2016, but Hulu beat him to the punch, releasing their Holmes-centered drama series in March 2022, which has gone on to be nominated for four Primetime Emmy Awards (winning one for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie for Seyfried).

Bad Blood will be based on the nonfiction book of the same name by journalist John Carreyrou (portrayed by Ebon Moss-Bachrach in the Hulu series) and adapted by Game of Thrones writer and co-executive producer Vanessa Taylor, who also adapted the screenplays for Netflix’s Hillbilly Elegy and The School for Good and Evil.

Lawrence was last linked to the project in January 2022 when McKay told Insider that she was actively working on her Holmes’ accent. When asked if she has “nailed the voice”, he said, “You know, I haven’t made her do it for me yet. She said she’s been working on it. She’s about to have a baby so I’m not going to bug her right now but she’s born to play that role. With the voice, she said she’s feeling it. She’s excited.”

Whether this is an act of self-awareness, recognition of audiences’ true crime fatigue (c’mon, two Candy Montgomery docudramas in one year???), or genuine admiration for another actor is still up for question, but it seems like a solid career choice for Lawrence as she just recently returned to acting following a brief hiatus caused by poor critical reception.

Since her return, she has starred in Netflix’s Don’t Look Up (also by McKay) and will lead Apple TV+’s Causeway, which releases November 4 on the streamer. Given Holmes’ quirky personality traits, Bad Blood might’ve signified a shift back to Lawrence’s trademark 2010s persona, which would’ve seemed redundant following her rebrand and comments about taking back her career after it was “hijacked”.

Thankfully, Lawrence stans won’t have to grieve too hard, as McKay’s film wasn’t the only upcoming project on her radar. The actor is currently shooting the 2023 coming-of-age comedy No Hard Feelings, in which she stars alongside Andrew Barth Feldman as a woman who answers a Craigslist ad from a mother looking for someone to date her college-bound son.