Emmy winner Allison Janney to play Tonya Harding’s mother in “I, Tonya”

PanARMENIAN.Net - While her CBS comedy “Mom” is on hiatus, Allison Janney has found another maternal role to play while waiting for its return, Variety said.

Sources tell Variety that the Emmy-winning actress is in talks to play Tonya Harding eccentric and tough mother LaVona in the Miramax biopic “I, Tonya”, starring Margot Robbie in the title role.

Sebastian Stan is on board to play Harding’s husband Jeff Gillooly. Craig Gillespie is directing. Miramax recently landed the rights to distribute the film.

Robbie will also produce along with Tom Ackerley through their Lucky Chap production company with Bryan Unkeless and Steven Rogers, who also wrote the screenplay.

Len Blavatnik and Aviv Giladi will executive produce for AI Film, which is financing the project. AI came onto the project in October. Sierra/Affinity is handling international sales on the film.

The film will spotlight Harding’s rise through the figure skating ranks and her infamous fall after she and Gillooly plotted an attack on fellow figure skater Nancy Kerrigan. Harding’s involvement in the act would eventually lead to her lifetime ban from the figure skating world.

ESPN’s “30 For 30” series did their own Harding doc which portrayed her mother an eccentric women who would do things like talk to her pet parrots. She was also particularly hard on Harding, especially during competitions.

Janney would shoot “I, Tonya” for a couple of weeks before returning to the “Mom” set and is planning a return to Broadway in “Six Degrees of Separation” next year. She was also recently seen as the detective in Amblin’s “The Girl on the Train.”