Derry Girls and Bridgerton star Nicola Coughlan, who last year also played one of the Barbies in Greta Gerwig’s box office smash Barbie, has booked the starring role in feature drama-thriller Love And War about a woman who must travel to Syria to find her abducted daughter.

Based on real events, the stirring story will chart Irish woman Sarah O’Meara’s struggle in September 2011 to rescue her six-year-old daughter who was abducted by her father, and smuggled to his native Syria, a country embroiled in the turmoil of civil war. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that O’Meara’s greatest challenge will not be surviving the war but finding a way to outwit her ex-husband, former abuser, and greatest love.

The project is inspired by the book Stolen: Escape From Syria by Louise Monaghan with Yvonne Kinsella.

Pic is to be directed by Lisa Mulcahy (Lies We Tell) and produced by Michael Garland (The Legend Of Longwood) of Grand Pictures from a script by Mulcahy and Elisabeth Gooch.

Irish Film & TV Award winner Coughlan said: “I am so honoured to be playing this role and to tell the story of Louise Monaghan’s incredible bravery”.

Monaghan added: “I am absolutely delighted to hear that the fantastically talented Derry Girls and Bridgerton star Nicola Coughlan is excited to take on my role and bring my story of perseverance and heartbreak to the big screen.”

Mulcahy commented: “I am so thrilled that Nicola Coughlan has come on board Love And War. She’s a wonderful, versatile actress and a lovely human, and I cannot wait to get together on this film, which I feel so passionately about.”

Coughlan is repped by Curtis Brown Group and Goodman, Genow.