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She is best-known for her anguished performances in films such as Kramer v Kramer and Sophie's Choice but Meryl Streep is now set to find her inner dancing queen.
The Hollywood star has been lined up to head the cast for the big-screen adaptation of the musical Mamma Mia!, the worldwide hit featuring 22 songs by Abba.
Following on her comic turn as a scary fashion editor in The Devil Wears Prada, Streep, 57, will play the single mother forced to confront her past when her daughter decides to marry.
In the lighthearted story, the daughter has never known her father but reads her mother's old diaries and invites three likely paternal candidates to the wedding with chaotic consequences.
Judy Craymer, who conceived the original stage production in London in 1999 and will produce the film with Tom Hanks's production company, Playtone, said she was thrilled to sign Streep.
"She was always at the top of our wish list, and she encapsulates the spirit and energy and has the powerhouse qualities that character requires," she said.
Streep has previously sung in films including Postcards from the Edge and the just-released A Prairie Home Companion and has been previously wooed for film adaptations including Evita.
She also performed several songs in a recent theatre production of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and her Children in New York.
Adam Dawtrey, of the trade title Variety which broke the story, said: "The first rule of casting is you can't go wrong with Meryl Streep. She fits everything.
"Casting her in Mamma Mia! immediately elevates what otherwise might have been seen as a particularly fluffy and flimsy musical to something else.
"The knock-on effect in terms of casting other roles could be huge. This is the first clear signal that this is going to happen and it's going to happen soon."
Other names associated with the part since the deal to film the stage show was struck last April include Catherine Zeta-Jones.
"She would have had her own appeal but doesn't have the same weight as Streep," Mr Dawtrey said.
That was important because what worked on stage sometimes required extra depth and substance to work on screen, he added.
Mamma Mia! was likely to be aimed at the same target audience as The Devil Wears Prada.
"If she needed re-establishing with a young female audience, she's right up there now because of The Devil Wears Prada. And it's the same dynamic - feisty older woman with a younger woman."
The film will be directed by Phyllida Lloyd who directed the production in London and then on Broadway.
Despite a lengthy CV as a heavyweight theatre and opera director, whose work includes Wagner's Ring Cycle for the English National Opera, this will be her first film.
Although Mamma Mia! might seem a major project for a movie debut, Universal, the studio involved, now has a long track record of trusting British talent.
Paul Greengrass, for example, had no experience of Hollywood blockbusters when they chose him to direct The Bourne Supremacy hot on the heels of making Bloody Sunday, based on the real events of Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland.
Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, the Abba songwriters, who gave their permission for the use of songs such as Take a Chance on Me and Dancing Queen in the show are executive producers on the film along with Tom Hanks and his wife, Rita Wilson.
Mamma Mia! has become a lucrative phenomenon on the stage with more productions playing worldwide than of any other show.
- INDEPENDENT
