‘Yellowjackets’ Star Sophie Nélisse to Lead Netflix Adaptation of Romance Novel ‘This Summer Will Be Different’

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Netflix Canada has found its Lucy. Yellowjackets and Heated Rivalry star Sophie Nélisse has been tapped to lead the upcoming romance series, This Summer Will Be Different, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

The 10-episode series is based on Carley Fortune’s popular romance novel of the same name and hails from Sphere Media. THR announced the series earlier this year.

Nélisse is set to take on the role of Lucy. Casting for her love interest, Felix, has yet to be announced.

The show’s logline describes the adaptation as “a simmering, sun-soaked romance set across multiple summers on Prince Edward Island about Lucy, a young woman navigating her 20s and her first real love with her best friend’s brother, the one person she was never supposed to fall for.”

The 26-year-old Canadian Nélisse has been starring as the younger version of Shauna in Showtime’s Yellowjackets since 2021 — it’s fourth and final season is expected to premiere later this year. In May, she earned a Canadian Screen Award for her role as Rose in the hit hockey romance series Heated Rivalry.

This Summer Will Be Different is filming this summer on Prince Edward Island and in Toronto. “Filming on Prince Edward Island is such a dream of mine,” Fortune previously told THR. “Danielle [Woodrow] and Tara [Woodbury], who head up Netflix Canada, we had had a drink together before they had even read it, and I loved them. Their view on TV and film just aligned so much with how I saw things.”

Dane Clark (Suze, One More Time) and Linsey Stewart (Workin’ Moms, North of North) serve as co-showrunners and executive producers on the series. Fortune is also an executive producer, alongside Jennifer Kawaja and Elise Cousineau for Sphere Media.

Thursday’s casting news comes on the heels of the renewal of Prime Video’s adaptation of Fortune’s debut novel Every Summer After. Fortune, along with the showrunner Amy B. Harris and actors Matt Cornett and Michael Bradway, announced that the show has been picked up for a second season at the recent YA fan-focused event Obsessed Fest.

This Summer Will Be Different joins a growing Canadian slate at Netflix, which first launched its domestic slate in the country in 2025. North of North, Wayward, which also hails from Sphere Media, Who Killed the Montreal Expos?, an untitled Newfoundland project and The Granville Girls round out the streamer’s Canadian lineup.

Nélisse is represented by Sean Liebowitz, Anabel Young and Steven Brown at CAA and Allie Veneris and Josh Glick at Brillstein Entertainment Partners.