Groff Featured in Upcoming Redford Film, 'The Conspirator'

SPRING AWAKENING and GLEE star Jonathan Groff, currently featured in the West End revival of DEATHTRAP, has a featured role in the new Robert Redford film "The Conspirator," which will be released in spring 2011.

Groff will play the role of Louis Weichman in a cast that also stars James McAvoy, Robin Wright, Alexis Bledel, Badge Dale, Danny Huston, Toby Kebbell, Kevin Kline, Justin Long, Colm Meaney, Stephen Root, Tom Wilkinson and Evan Rachel Wood.

The film explores the national reaction to Lincoln's assassination and features direction by Academy Award winner Redford and a screenplay by James Solomon.

According to studio notes, "In the wake of Abraham Lincoln's assassination seven men and one woman are arrested and charged with conspiring to kill the President, Vice President, and Secretary of State. The lone woman charged, Mary Surratt (Robin Wright), 42, owns a boarding house where John Wilkes Booth (Toby Kebbell), 26, and others met and planned the simultaneous attacks. Against the ominous back-drop of post-Civil War Washington, newly-minted lawyer Frederick Aiken (James McAvoy), a 28-year-old Union war-hero, reluctantly agrees to defend Surratt before a military tribunal. Aiken realizes his client may be innocent and that she is being used as bait and hostage in order to capture the only conspirator to have escaped a massive manhunt, her own son, John (Johnny Simmons). As the nation turns against her, Surratt is forced to rely on Aiken to uncover the truth and save her life."

"The Conspirator" is being produced by The American Film Company in association with Wildwood Enterprises.

Groff will also be seen in the independent film "Twelve Thirty," which opens at the Angelika Film Center in New York Jan. 14, 2011.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride/WM Photos