Sarah Silverman Joins Cast of Billie Jean King Pic ‘Battle of the Sexes’

Sarah Silverman. Image by Getty Images

By Maia Efrem March 24, 2016

Sarah Silverman is stretching her acting chops in her second foray in a drama as she joins the cast of “Battle of the Sexes,” a retelling of the historic 1973 tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs.

According to , Silverman joins co-stars Emma Stone and Steve Carrel and will play Gladys Heldman, the founder of World Tennis magazine, who also helped organize King and other female players on a women’s only game circuit because they were not paid as much as their male cohorts. Heldman was later inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.

King, 29 at the time, was the number two ranked female player in the world when she beat Riggs, a 55-year-old retired Wimbledon champion, in a much publicized match.

Silverman’s first dramatic performance was in this past fall’s “I Smile Back” about a woman dealing with depression. The role garnered critical acclaim and a SAG nomination.

Maia Efrem is the former research editor and assistant to the editor and was also responsible for the Forward’s annual Salary Survey. Previously she served as the editor of Blognik Beat, a blog written by students who emigrated from or have ties to the Former Soviet Union. Maia is a graduate of Hunter College and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.

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