Borderlands Movie Sets New Additions Including Gina Gershon as Moxxi

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Lionsgate has announced seven new cast additions to director Eli Roth’s upcoming live-action film adaptation of Borderlands as production continues in Hungary. Gina Gershon (Face/Off) and Cheyenne Jackson (American Horror Story) have officially joined the star-studded ensemble cast of Borderlands, portraying the respective roles of Mad Moxxi and Jakobs. In the video games, Moxxi is a non-playable character that owns a number of bars in Pandora, while Jakobs is a weapons manufacturer.

“I am so excited to work with this incredible, top-notch cast,” Roth said in a statement (via Deadline). “Every single part counts and elevates the film, and we have the best of the best coming in to really make Borderlands spectacular. I love movies where every character counts, and you can only achieve that with a great cast. Every one of these gifted actors will bring something special to the film.”

Charles Babalola (Gretel & Hansel), Benjamin Byron Davis (Criminal Minds), Steven Boyer (Trial & Error) and Ryann Redmond (Younger) have also been cast for the roles of Hammerlock, Marcus, Scooter, and Ellie, with Bobby Lee (The Dictator) boarding the project in the new role of Larry.

Based on one of the world’s most successful video game franchises from developer Gearbox Software and publisher 2K Games, Borderlands centers around a group of unlikely heroes called Vault Hunters led by Lilith and Roland, who have been recruited for a retrieval mission. According to Gearbox Software, the film will exist in a different universe than the game, which is why the film’s story will stray away from the first game.

Lilith, an infamous outlaw with a mysterious past, reluctantly returns to her home planet of Pandora to find the missing daughter of the universe’s most powerful S.O.B., Atlas. Lilith forms an alliance with an unexpected team – Roland, a former elite mercenary, now desperate for redemption; Tiny Tina, a feral pre-teen demolitionist; Krieg, Tina’s musclebound, rhetorically challenged protector; Tannis, the scientist with a tenuous grip on sanity; and Claptrap, a persistent wiseass robot. These unlikely heroes must battle alien monsters and dangerous bandits to find and protect the missing girl, who may hold the key to unimaginable power. The fate of the universe could be in their hands – but they’ll be fighting for something more: each other.

The film adaptation stars Cate Blanchett as Lilith, Edgar Ramirez as Atlas, Kevin Hart as Roland, Jamie Lee Curtis as Tannis, Jack Black as Claptrap, Ariana Greenblatt as Tiny Tina, Florian Munteanu as Krieg, Olivier Richters as Krom, and Haley Bennett in an unknown new role for the series. Janina Gavankar has also been cast for the key role of Commander Knoxx, a newly created character for the film.

Borderlands is being directed by Eli Roth from a screenplay written by Craig Mazin, who is also currently working on HBO’s series adaptation of another popular video game The Last of Us. Producers are Arad Productions’ Avi Arad and Ari Arad, along with Picturestart’s Erik Feig.

Randy Pitchford, executive producer of the Borderlands video game franchise and founder of Gearbox, is executive producing along with Strauss Zelnick, chairman and CEO of Take-Two Interactive. Lionsgate’s James Myers and Aaron Edmonds oversee the project along with Arad’s Emmy Yu and Picturestart’s Lucy Kitada and Royce Reeves-Darby.