Aubrey Plaza will soon add director to her list of credentials. In an interview with GQ, The White Lotus season 2 star talked about an upcoming project she’s writing and directing. While secretive about the plot of the upcoming film, Plaza did mention what director she’d like to match:

The actress and producer added that the upcoming family-friendly film would be something like Hocus Pocus or Beetlejuice.

“I’m trying to fill the female Tim Burton slot," she told the publication.

Earlier this year, while appearing at a London Film Festival ScreenTalk to discuss Emily the Criminal, Plaza spoke about her desire to direct in the future. While Plaza said that she had been offered the opportunity to direct, she felt passionate about directing something she had written herself. In the recently released film, Plaza portrays the titular character, a young unemployed woman burdened with art school debt, who descends into a life of crime to gain financial freedom. The film premiered during the 2022 Sundance Film Festival to critical acclaim.

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Plaza’s career has blossomed since her breakout role in 2009 portraying April Ludgate on NBC’s Parks and Recreation. Following the series’ conclusion in 2015, Plaza appeared in films including Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates, Dirty Grandpa, Child’s Play, Happiest Season, and The Little Hours (which she also produced). In 2018, Plaza received the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Feature for producing Ingrid Goes West (she also portrayed the titular character). Last year, she received an Imagen Award for Best Actress for Black Bear.

Aubrey Plaza’s “Good Year”

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Plaza currently stars in the second season of The White Lotus, as a Harper, a lawyer on vacation with her husband. She told GQ that Harper is a character she’s portrayed that she identifies with the most, saying the project is “close to home.”

The White Lotus director Mike White, who Plaza considers a friend, spoke to GQ about Plaza saying:

She also voices the character of Laura on the adult animated-series Little Demon and will next appear in Guy Ritchie’s Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre. She has been cast to appear in the upcoming WandaVision spinoff Agatha: Coven of Chaos, where she will reunite with Parks and Recreation co-star Kathryn Hahn. This August, Plaza’s participation in Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis was announced. She joins a star-studded cast that includes Adam Driver, Forest Whitaker, and Dustin Hoffman.

“Obviously, Aubrey plays deadpan, she plays to the humorous aspects of her dark side. But the more you know her, you realize she’s very big-hearted and, in a way, insecure. The classic somebody who is projecting strength, but the vulnerability is so palpably there. I just felt like it would be fun to capture some of that, something that I haven’t seen her do.”

About working with two award-winning directors, Plaza says:

“To go from Mike White to Francis Ford Coppola, that’s a good year for me. I’m trying to manifest this. I’m trying to work with brilliant directors.”