Ricki Lake is stepping back in front of the camera. The veteran actress and daytime talk show host has signed on to lead Lifetime's upcoming original movie "She Married Her Murderer: The Susan Cox Powell Story," marking her first substantial acting role in years after a long stretch spent largely behind the microphone and in the producer's chair.
The project revisits one of the most closely followed missing-person cases of the past two decades. Susan Cox Powell vanished from her home in West Valley City, Utah, in December 2009. She was never found. Her husband, Josh Powell, was the focus of intense scrutiny from investigators and the public alike, though he was never charged in connection with her disappearance. He died in 2012 when he set fire to his rented home during a supervised visit with the couple's two young sons, killing himself and the children. The tragedy left Susan's family and a national audience without the answers they had spent years demanding.
Lake's involvement with the Susan Cox Powell story is not new. She hosted a daytime talk show from 2012 to 2017, and before that she had already come to know the case through her earlier syndicated program in the 1990s; Susan's parents, Chuck and Judy Cox, appeared on that show to plead for information about their daughter. Lake also produced and appeared in a 2013 Lifetime movie built around the case, which focused on the disappearance itself and the questions that swirled around Josh Powell. This new production takes a broader narrative approach, tracing the relationship from courtship through marriage and into the events that made Susan's name a household reference point for domestic danger.
For Lake, the role represents a return to her roots. She broke through as a teenager in John Waters' 1988 comedy "Hairspray," playing the exuberant Tracy Turnblad, and followed it with the 1990 musical "Cry-Baby," also directed by Waters. Her big-screen career continued through the early 1990s with credits including "Buffalo '66" and a memorable turn in the original "Serial Mom." But it was television that made her a fixture of American pop culture: "The Ricki Lake Show," launched in 1993, turned her into one of the most recognizable hosts of the era, and she later returned to the format with a second talk venture in the 2010s. She has worked steadily as a producer and documentary filmmaker in the years since, most notably with "The Business of Being Born," which examined American childbirth practices.
["Acting is where I started, and it's the thing I love most,"] Lake said in a statement accompanying the announcement, adding that the Susan Cox Powell story is one she has carried with her for years and that she feels a deep responsibility to the family.
A Case That Refuses to Fade
The Susan Cox Powell saga has spawned documentaries, podcasts, books and countless hours of cable news coverage. What keeps drawing audiences back, observers say, is the collision of ordinary domestic life with an outcome that defied every effort at resolution. Susan was a young mother who kept a journal, worked a steady job and, according to those who knew her, tried repeatedly to hold her marriage together. Her disappearance exposed fault lines in how local authorities initially handled the case, and it fueled years of speculation about what really happened inside that house.
Lifetime has built a significant portion of its original movie slate around true-crime stories, particularly those centering on women who become victims of intimate-partner violence. The network has found a durable audience for these dramatizations, which tend to blend reenactment with a pointed social message. Positioning Lake at the center of this particular title is a calculated move: she brings name recognition across multiple generations and a personal connection to the material that few actresses could match.
What Lake Brings to the Part
Casting Lake in a project of this nature raises an interesting question about how the film will frame its central figure. Lake built her career on a persona that was warm, direct and unafraid to press guests for honesty. That same quality may serve the material well, allowing her to portray a woman whose story has too often been told by others. The announcement did not specify which role Lake will play, leaving open the possibility that she appears as a family member, an advocate or another figure close to the case.
Production details, including a premiere date and the full cast, have not been announced. USA Film News will update this story as more information becomes available.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter