Naomi Watts has been signed to play the lead role in the forthcoming Game of Thrones prequel.

Axar.az reports citing Foreign media.

Little is known about Watts’s character yet, but Variety reports that she will play “a charismatic socialite hiding a dark secret”.

Watts, best known for star turns in Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive, was also recently signed to Fox’s Roger Ailes biopic, playing anchor Gretchen Carlson.

The new show, as revealed earlier this year, will be set millennia before the events of Game of Thrones. According to HBO, it will “chronicle the world’s descent from the Golden Age of Heroes into its darkest hour”.

They put five separate prequels and spinoffs into development; this project, from Kingsman screenwriter Jane Goldman, is the only one to be given the go-ahead.

The new show is not expected to air until at least 2020. Game of Thrones will complete its run in 2019.