Dame Helen Mirren has confirmed she will join the production "for the fun of it".

The acclaimed actor will join Dwayne Johnson and Vin Diesel in Fast 8, which has already begun production in Cuba and Iceland and will continue filming in the US later this year.

In an interview with Elle, she revealed she was joining the huge franchise, saying she aimed to make her film choices a mix of "some fun and some relevant, serious, important movies".

"I've always rather loved driving. I said, 'I'll be in it, but only if I'm allowed to drive if I do drive in it.' ... I love going to the films. I like very serious films, I love foreign films, and I love big, fun movies – as long as they're well made and they've got good scripts. That's the most important thing."

The announcement comes after Mirren told British chat-show host Graham Norton in April that Fast and Furious would be her dream job, to an incredulous Norton and audience.

"It's incredible fun to do those movies – you don't act," she explained. "No acting required."

"Things explode all around you. It's unbelievable fun. And that with cars would be my dream come true."

It's not the first action role for Mirren, who won an Oscar for her performance as Queen Elizabeth II in The Queen (2006). She played gun-toting badass in Red (2010) and Red 2 (2013), about retired CIA agents alongside Bruce Willis and John Malkovich.

Her latest role has been as a British army commander in Eye in the Sky, a thriller about drone warfare set in Kenya, in which she starred alongside the late Alan Rickman.

Also joining the Fast and Furious franchise for the first time is Charlize Theron, who will appear alongside other series stalwarts Michelle Rodriguez, Chris Bridges, Kurt Russell and Jason Statham.

Fast and Furious remains one of the most lucrative film franchises of all time, pulling in $US3.9 billion ($5.26 billion) from a relatively low count of seven instalments compared with its high-earning series peers such as the Harry Potter, James Bond and Marvel's Avengers.

Fast 8 is set to reach cinemas in April, 2017.