RAYE will create original music and voice a character in Benny Safdie’s “Lizard Music”. Based on Daniel Pinkwater’s 1976 novel, the film follows a boy who discovers an unusual late-night television broadcast featuring musical lizards. Dwayne Johnson stars, with a US cinema release scheduled for December 25, 2027. The singer’s character and the details of her musical contribution have not yet been announced.
RAYE is preparing a film collaboration involving two different responsibilities. She will create original music for “Lizard Music”, written and directed by Benny Safdie, while also lending her voice to a character. The production adapts Daniel Pinkwater’s 1976 book and combines live actors with computer-generated figures. Neither her particular role nor the songs she will write have been identified, leaving the precise shape of the dual contribution to be explained later.
Her involvement was announced on Friday, October 30, after the film had already secured a US release date for Christmas 2027. The story begins when a boy discovers an unusual late-night television transmission. On screen, lizards play music unlike anything he has heard before. His decision to find the source of that broadcast sets the adventure in motion, placing music within the premise rather than adding it only as accompaniment.
Theo Leber plays the boy, while Dwayne Johnson portrays an eccentric older man known as Chicken Man, who becomes an unexpected companion. Chicken Man is accompanied by Claudia, an elderly chicken described as his close partner. The search leads towards a hidden community. These elements establish the imaginative setting, but do not identify where RAYE’s compositions will be heard or which part of that world her character will occupy.
The production has not clarified whether her music belongs within the strange television broadcast or appears elsewhere in the film. That remains an important distinction between the plot’s musical starting point and the work commissioned from the singer. An assignment to create original music also does not establish that she is exclusively responsible for the entire score. The announced contribution should not be expanded beyond the description that has been provided.
Pinkwater’s novel was published in 1976. The American author is associated with children’s and young-adult stories in which ordinary situations meet unusual characters and unexpected events. Safdie is adapting the book as well as directing. The combination of filmed actors and digitally created imagery offers a way of presenting the fictional inhabitants of its world, while retaining human performers within the same screen adventure.
The October 30 announcement confirms that RAYE will perform a voice role without specifying the character. This differs from a conventional on-camera appearance by a singer. Her voice will help bring someone within the story to life, but there is no confirmation that it will be one of the lizards or any other particular figure. Assigning her a character now would go beyond the information released by the production.
The cast includes Alicia Silverstone, Regina Hall, Tim Heidecker, Arya Parvathi and Andrew Dice Clay. Other announced voice performers include Colman Domingo, Jeff Goldblum, Rachel McAdams and David Krumholtz. The distinction between actors appearing on camera and those providing voices matters for a production mixing live-action and digital characters. Specific role details remain unavailable for several contributors, not only for the newly announced singer.
Johnson also participates as a producer through Seven Bucks Productions. Other producers include Safdie, David Koplan and United Artists’ Scott Stuber and Nick Nesbitt. Johnson and Safdie previously worked together on 2025’s “The Smashing Machine”, in which the actor portrayed mixed martial artist Mark Kerr. “Lizard Music” reunites them in a very different kind of story, moving from that subject into an imaginative adventure adapted from a book.
For RAYE, the project follows her second studio album, “This Music May Contain Hope”, released during 2026. Her recording identity combines pop, soul and jazz influences with attention to performance and arrangements. “WHERE IS MY HUSBAND!” is among the familiar releases of the recent period. The film announcement was not accompanied by a new personal single or a separate full soundtrack album bearing her name.
Her screen activity had already become visible earlier in the year. In May, she was announced for “Lineage”, Yann Demange’s London-set crime film, her first announced dramatic feature role. She had previously appeared as herself in Netflix’s “Black Rabbit”. The new project offers another kind of work again, combining voice performance with composition rather than repeating either a self-portrayal or an identified live-action dramatic character.
The US cinema release of “Lizard Music” is scheduled for December 25, 2027 through Amazon MGM Studios. No corresponding Greek release date has been announced. The date supplies a timetable for the production as a whole, rather than an earlier schedule for the music. The titles, number of original pieces and precise ways they will be integrated into the film’s story have not been presented alongside the casting information.
For now, the most specific musical development is the agreement for RAYE to contribute original compositions, with a separate voice role also confirmed. A boy’s discovery of musical lizards supplies the film’s starting point, but the singer’s place within that world remains undisclosed. Further production material will be needed to explain the character, recordings and arrangements behind the dual assignment ahead of the planned Christmas 2027 release.
