Queen Latifah to star in The Tiger Rising film adaptation

Queen Latifah has signed on to front a big screen adaptation of children's book The Tiger Rising.

The Star actress will take on the role of wise housekeeper Willie May in the upcoming film, which will be based on Kate DiCamillo's 2001 work about a 12-year-old boy named Rob Horton who finds a caged tiger in the centre of the woods near his home.

Other key characters include Rob's father Robert Horton, Rob's classmate Sistine Bailey, her mother Mrs. Bailey, and school principal Mr. Phelmer.

No further casting details or a potential release date has been announced. Latifah will also serve as an executive producer on the project, which is set to begin shooting in the fall.

However, it is known that Ray Giarratana has adapted the screenplay and will direct the feature. The filmmaker previously acted as a visual effects supervisor on movies such as 2016's Captain America: Civil War, and the recently released John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum.

Latifah has just finished a three-season run as Carlotta Brown on now-cancelled TV series Star and played Sasha Franklin in hit 2017 comedy Girls Trip.

She is in the pre-production phases of Angela Tucker's drama Paper Chase and Jeffrey Reyes' King of the South, a biopic about Master P, the hip-hop mogul and founder of No Limit Records, and is also producing TV movie The Clark Sisters: The First Ladies of Gospel and comedy The Trap.

Newbery Medal-winning writer DiCamillo is known for her 2003 novel The Tale of Despereaux and 2013's Flora & Ulysses, while her 2000 book Because of Winn-Dixie was made into a family film by director Wayne Wang in 2005.