Peter Sarsgaard, Winona Ryder Board Indie Drama 'Experimenter'

Michael Almereyda is directing the story of famed social psychologist Stanley Milgram.

Peter Sarsgaard and Winona Ryder are starring in Experimenter, The Stanley Milgram Story, an indie drama written and directed by Michael Almereyda.

The movie will start shooting June 5 in New York and is being produced by Uri Singer of B.B. Films, Fabio Golombek of F.J. Productions, and Intrinsic Value’s Aimee Schoof and Isen Robbins.

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According to the producers, the script is based on “the true story of famed social psychologist Stanley Milgram, who in 1961 designed the controversial Obedience Experiments at Yale University, observing the responses of ordinary people who believed they were sending harmful electrical shocks to an affable stranger.”

“The experiments were about conformity and authority, and their implications continue to be deeply unsettling and resonant. But this was just the start of a wide-ranging career for Milgram, who also came up with the Small-World Experiment, the basis for Six Degrees of Separation.”

Sarsgaard is playing Milgram, while Ryder is playing one of his students, Sasha Menkin, who helps with the experiments and with whom he falls in love.

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Josh Hamilton (American Horror Story), Jim Gaffigan (Super Troopers), Dennis Haysbert (24) and Danny A. Abeckaser (The Iceman) are also in the movie.

Jeff Rice, Lati Grobman and Christa Campbell are executive producing.

Ryder, repped by Gersh and Hirsch Wallerstein, last appeared in Homefront with Jason Statham and James Franco.

Sarsgaard’s recent credits include Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine and Lovelace. He is repped by CAA, Authentic Talent and Literary, and Peikoff Mahan.