A Pop Star With Over 50 Million Spotify Listeners Almost Starred In Sinners

If you saw "Sinners" when it released in April 2025, you were probably blown away by actress and musician Hailee Steinfeld's gripping and, as it turns out, deeply personal performance as Mary, a multiracial woman living in the American South. Mary, who passes as white but has definitive Black heritage in her family's lineage — and romances one of the film's central twins, Elias "Stack" Moore (Michael B. Jordan, who also plays Elijah "Smoke" Moore) — is a pivotal part of the narrative, and it's easy to imagine that a lot of actresses dreamed of playing this role. As it turns out, pop superstar Halsey did read the script for "Sinners" and made a pretty important point about the field of performers who could have played the role.

Steinfeld, for clarity, is multiracial; her mother's father was half Black and half Filipino. Halsey, whose real name is Ashley Nicolette Frangipane, is the daughter of a Black man— and like Steinfeld, she self-describes as "white-passing." As Halsey told actor and singer Owen Thiele on his podcast "In Your Dreams" in May of this year, she hadn't seen "Sinners" yet at the time, but because of her identity, she did get a look at writer-director Ryan Coogler's script.

After saying, again, that she hadn't caught the film, Halsey revealed, "I read the script though. I did read the script. There's not a lot of white-passing Black girls in Hollywood. So I did read the script." Still, the "Without Me" songstress clarified that Steinfeld playing the role of Mary made "perfect sense," so clearly, she supports her fellow performer. It's certainly interesting that Halsey read for this movie, though, because Steinfeld has been quite open about how much she connected to this particular role.

Hailee Steinfeld has talked extensively about her experience playing Mary — who, partway through the film, becomes (spoiler alert!) a vampire who ultimately brings Stack to the dark side with her, granting the two of them eternal life — and in a conversation with People Magazine, she said that the preparation for the role was incredibly personal to her. "It had such an impact on me personally," she said. "Therefore, I feel like the least it can do is make an impact on those that watch it. I think it affected all of us so personally and so deeply, and I do believe that you feel that and you see that when you watch this movie."

Not only that, but Steinfeld said that the movie was personal to most of the main cast members, including Michael B. Jordan, Miles Caton, Wunmi Mosaku, and Li Jun Li (who, besides Jordan, play musician Sammie, Stack's wife and Hoodoo expert Annie, and shopkeeper and mother Grace, respectively). "I'm so grateful for the deeply personal connection that each of us have [to the material]," Steinfeld continued, "mine being with my family history, with my grandfather, who I wish was still here to answer all the questions that I have that this movie raised for me and making this movie raised."

After saying the role was "unlike any role that [she has] ever played," Steinfeld said, "This character challenged me in ways I've never been challenged. And in ways I don't know I would have been able to sort of tackle and overcome had it happened any sooner in my life." The Oscar nominee also spoke to Blavity about the experience of watching the movie with her family, saying that she thought about her grandfather and that her "imagination ran wild with thoughts of what his life might've looked like growing up, what his parents' life might've looked like."

Ultimately, the experience was so vital for Steinfeld. "I'm just so honored to be a part of this story and of this world that, while it's wild, and exciting, and fun, and there's jump scares that'll really get you, and the music is incredible– it's so important," she concluded. "And this served me in a way that I didn't know I needed so bad."

Halsey may have read the script for "Sinners," but Hailee Steinfeld, according to a feature in Who What Wear, put herself forward for the part of Mary — and in said feature, she's quite clear about the fact that Ryan Coogler's name attracted her to the project in the first place. (While this is Coogler's first original feature film, his track record, which includes "Fruitvale Station," the "Creed" movies, and Marvel's "Black Panther" films, certainly speaks for itself.) "You hear that, and your ears perk up instantly," Steinfeld recalled of hearing there was a new Coogler film in the works. "I always have this conversation with my agents where it's like, 'Even if there's not a part for me, let me take a meeting,'" she said.

"When I read the script, it was one of those things where it's just a feeling," Steinfeld recalled. "It's a feeling I've only got a handful of times, and that's a privilege and a blessing. But it's a feeling that, once you have felt it, you crave nothing but that feeling." Then, when she booked the role of Mary, Steinfeld compared her feeling in the moment to when she booked "True Grit," the Coen brothers remake of the famous Western that released in 2010 and earned Steinfeld an Oscar nod. "My whole world just stopped, and it was like, 'What do we do?! We've got to celebrate!'" Steinfeld remembered.

Ultimately, Steinfeld said that working on the set of "Sinners" was transformative for her, right down to the short haircut she got to play Mary. "I think there was a part of this experience that forced me to grow and left me no choice," she concluded. "['Sinners'] was truly something that will stay with me for the rest of my life for so many reasons, but one being that this was a role that I had been waiting for, and I hope and pray that I get to do a million more of these because I do think that's part of this next phase of life," she said.

"Sinners" is getting a re-release in select theaters for Halloween and is streaming on HBO Max now.