Joey King, McG teaming up for new Netflix project ‘Uglies’

Joey King will star in McG’s Netflix adaptation of the dystopian fantasy Uglies

Netflix and Joey King are teaming up for another project, this time with an adaptation of Scott Westerfeld’s dystopian fantasy Uglies. McG, who has been working steadily on Netflix projects, will direct.

According to a report from Deadline, King is a huge fan of Uglies, which is a futuristic story where an ideal standard of beauty exists and everyone is subjected to an operation as a teen so that they fit those ideals. (It’s reminiscent of the classic episode of The Twilight Zone, “Number 12 Looks Just Like You.”) King took the story to Netflix and made the deal happen.

Krista Vernoff has been tapped to write the script based on Westerfeld’s book. King, Westerfeld and Jamie King will serve executive producers.

Uglies is a very interesting project because of its real-world connections. Not only is there a message about embracing differences, but there is also a message about the danger of putting too much emphasis on physical appearance. With so many people on social media going to extraordinary lengths to gain stardom, some stop at nothing to achieve the perfect look. In Uglies, the playing field is leveled because everyone is “beautiful” but if everyone is “beautiful” then does “beauty” exist?

King has a strong relationship with Netflix after the success of The Kissing Booth, and she’s currently working on, starring in or attached to a number of projects including a costarring role with Brad Pitt in Bullet Train. She’s also developing projects under her first-look deal with Hulu after the success of her role in The Act.

The 21 year old actor is the youngest person to land a streaming deal, but there’s no question that she has an eye for successful projects and that makes her a very valuable commodity.