EXCLUSIVE: Lifetime has greenlit two new original ‘Ripped from the Headlines’ movies for 2025 including the Dascha Polanco-led (Orange is the New Black, Poker Face) thriller Terror Comes Knocking: The Marcela Borges Story and Girl in the Garage: The Laura Cowan Story starring Paige Hurd (Power Book II: Ghost), Brad James (Shirley) and Stephen Bishop (Moneyball).
In Terror Comes Knocking: The Marcela Borges Story, Marcela Borges (Polanco) and her growing family’s idyllic weekend quickly turn into every family’s worst nightmare when masked gunmen barge into their Florida suburban home. With gunshots piercing their walls, a newly pregnant Marcela, her husband, and their young son are left with no choice but to comply with their captors’ demands: surrender $200,000 or their lives.
But with no means of accessing that sort of money, Marcela faces insurmountable odds to protect her family from their violent captors and must make the life and death decisions to keep her family safe.
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The based on a true story title premieres on January 11 and is produced by Cineflix Productions for Lifetime. Jeff Vanderwal executive produces while Felipe Rodriguez directs from a script by Crystal Verge.
Girl in the Garage: The Laura Cowan Story is based on a true story, after her husband Shabazz (James) is arrested, Laura (Hurd) struggles to make ends meet. When a family friend Musa (Bishop) offers to move her and her children into his home temporarily, Laura is relieved. She believes this kindness will give her time to get back on her feet.
Overnight, this blessing turns into a nightmare when Laura and her children endure extensive mental and physical abuse and are forced into dehumanizing conditions. Laura is repeatedly sexually assaulted by Musa and eventually held captive with her children in a garage. She later discovers she is not the only one he is tormenting. Despite the dark conditions surrounding her, Laura manages to keep her faith and documents her ordeal until she sneaks a note to the outside world, leading authorities to her eventual rescue.
The film will premiere on January 18 and is produced by Poke Prod for Lifetime and executive produced by Sean Dwyer and Elizabeth Cullen. Manu Boyer directs from a script by Avery O. Williams. Cowan serves as co-producer on the movie.
Polanco is repped by the Gersh Agency, Liebman Entertainment and Goodman Genow Schenkman; Hurd is repped by CMA Entertainment and Buchwald; James is repped by J Pervis Talent Agency, Integral Artist and Goodman Genow Schenkman; Bishop is repped by Greene Talent and Weiner Management.
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