‘Euphoria’ star Sydney Sweeney is receiving raves for her role in the film ‘Reality’. Following the film’s premiere at the Berlin Film Festival on February 18, 2023 — and staggeringly positive reviews — HBO has moved to pickup distribution rights.

Reality Winner Story

In 2018 Reality Winner, a former intelligence contractor for NSA, left her National Security Agency contractor’s office at the Fort Gordon army base in Georgia. In hand was a single intelligence report about Russian attempts to meddle in the 2016 presidential election that saw Donald J. Trump beat Hillary Clinton for the White House.

To be honest, AOC has no recollection of this story — as closely as we follow American politics. We couldn’t have been more involved in the 2016 presidential election and claims of Russian interference. And we do believe that Russia absolutely interfered in the 2016 election, with help from Americans.

Winner was sentenced to five years in prison in 2018, supposedly the longest ever handed down by a US federal court to any individual convicted of providing federal government information to the media without permission.

Winner’s relationship with her family only grew stronger during her incarceration. Her mother refused to leave her alone in a Ft. Worth women’s prison, which was a positive gesture, considering the whistleblower’s obsession with suicide.

Watch the ‘60 Minutes’ interview with Ms. Winner, after she was released from prison.

The Film ‘Reality’

In a five-star review from The Guardian, Peter Bradshaw wrote: 'This, the film says, is what it really feels like to be on the receiving end of the law in a case like this: a calm, professional, technocratic but relentless display of overwhelming power.'

'Reality’ transcends staginess as a strikingly well-realised piece of filmmaking, using judicious sound design and expressive lighting to gain a surreally vivid edge,' wrote Tim Robey in the The Telegraph.

Tina Satter directed the film, based on the story of Reality Winner’s day that the FBI showed up at her door. This press conference video says much about the structure of the FBI investigation and ‘friendly’ confrontation with Winner at her home. The FBI interview is also discussed in the ‘60 Minutes’ video.

Actors Marchant Davis, Josh Hamilton, and Benny Elledge have roles in the film.

“Reality,” is scripted verbatim from exchanges recorded by the FBI during Winner’s 2017 surprise interrogation in Georgia. Satter not only vividly revisits the story, but the director also makes us question the very relationship between a narrative film and the truth it claims to expose, wrote Variety. Reality can be stranger than fiction, but “Reality” fuses the two to become stranger, and more riveting, still.

Sydney Sweeney is pictured below at the Armani Beauty party in Berlin for the premiere of ‘Reality’. She became an ambassador for the beauty brand in January 2023. The actor is also an ambassador for Tory Burch.

Sweeney’s list of other projects includes ‘The Handmaid’s Tale, ‘Sharp Pbjects’, ‘The White Lotus and ‘Euphoria’.