Carey Mulligan To Play Daisy In 'The Great Gatsby'

After nearly every beautiful actress in Hollywood was rumored to play iconic beauty Daisy Buchanan in the upcoming Baz Luhrmann adaptation of The Great Gatsby, young Brit Carey Mulligan has landed the role.

Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson, Blake Lively, Rebecca Hall, Amanda Seyfried, Keira Knightley and Michelle Williams were all, at one point or another, supposedly in contention for the role. But it was Mulligan, 25, who had the privilege of answering a very special phone call while on the red carpet for the CFDA awards—"Hello, Daisy Buchanan," Luhrmann said to her, causing the starlet to burst into tears in front of Karl Lagerfeld and Anna Wintour.

"Regarding the role of Daisy Buchanan, I was privileged to explore the character with some of the world's most talented actresses, each one bringing their own particular interpretation, all of which were legitimate and exciting," Luhrmann told Deadline Hollywood. "However, specific to this particular production of The Great Gatsby, I was thrilled to pick up the phone an hour ago to the young Oscar-nominated British actress Carey Mulligan."

The actress, who has received huge plaudits for her work, including an Oscar nomination for An Education, will join Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire, who have already signed on as Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway, respectively. The only previous major movie adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic novel is the 1974 version, which starred Mia Farrow as Buchanan and Robert Redford as Gatsby. –AMY LEE