Pop’s most unbothered hitmaker is stepping a little further into film.
It’s funny how high school never really leaves pop culture, it just gets re-cast with better lighting and sharper dialogue.
There’s nothing quite like it: the quiet currency of popularity, the hierarchy everyone seems to understand without ever agreeing on the rules (out loud anyway).
The “mean girl” is someone you either study up close, or someone you understand from a distance. But still, we all know the type.
Maybe that’s why she keeps getting reworked onscreen – because it’s less about who she was, and more about what she represents.
Now, that archetype is getting another pass – this time via A24.
As of March 26, Dua Lipa has officially joined the cast of Peaked, a new comedy about two former high school “mean girls” returning for their 10-year reunion, still chasing the echo of who they used to be.
The film is directed by Molly Gordon, coming off Theater Camp and The Bear, with a script from Allie Levitan – so expect something sharp, awkward and self-aware rather than glossy.
It’s also stacked cast-wise. Lipa joins Emma Mackey, Laura Dern, Simone Ashley, Alex Consani, Levon Hawke, Amy Sedaris and Connor Storrie.
She’s already dipped into film with cameos in Barbie and Argylle, but Peaked sits in a different lane – an ensemble role, rather than a blink-and-you-miss-it appearance.
The more interesting part isn’t whether she fits the archetype, but what she does with it.
Because we all recognise the “mean girl” – even if we only ever watched her from a step or two outside the frame.
The question Peaked seems to be asking is what happens when that social power gets revisited years later, when the architecture has collapsed but the memory hasn’t.
Production starts in April. Nespresso ambassador duties, film sets, and ongoing speculation around the next James Bond theme song are all orbiting the same moment in her career – but this one feels grounded in something simpler.
A reunion. A role. A character we think we already know.
We never really outgrow high school. But Dua Lipa in high school? That’s a version we’re very keen to watch unfold.
