‘The Brutalist’: Joel Edgerton, Marion Cotillard, And More Star In Brady Corbet’s Immigrant Drama
It’s film festival season, which means we’re getting a surge in casting news for arthouse dramas that feature a few buzzy stars and are helmed by a rising auteur. And that’s what we’re getting withThe Brutalist, a “sweeping immigrant drama” fromVox LuxdirectorBrady Corbetwhich has landed quite a star-studded cast of stars who look good in 1940s fashion, includingJoel Edgerton,Marion Cotillard, andMark Rylance.
Deadline reports that Edgerton, Oscar winners Cotillard and Rylance, as well asSebastian Stan(Captain America) andVanessa Kirby (The Crown) are set to star inThe Brutalist, Corbet’s follow-up to his pop star drama starring Natalie Portman, 2018’sVox Lux.Corbet will be taking a big 180 from the borderline satire ofVox Luxto helm a postwar immigrant drama described as an “epic saga and unconventional love story.”
Co-written with his partner Mona Fastvold,The Brutalistchronicles “30 years in the life of a visionary architect named László Toth (Edgerton) and his wife Erzsébet (Cotillard) who flee post-war Europe to rebuild their legacy and witness the birth of modern America. However, their lives are changed forever by a mysterious and wealthy client (Rylance),” per Deadline. The film’s protagonists are both Holocaust survivors, according to Corbet, and the film will shoot in English, Yiddish, Hungarian and some Italian.
“Amidst a revamped cycle of populism and prejudice in the 21st Century,The Brutalistis a film which celebrates the triumphs of the most daring and accomplished visionaries; our ancestors,” Corbet said in a statement. “It is the project which is so far the closest to my heart and family history. I so look forward to reuniting with many of our closest collaborators, as well as some exciting new ones, to realise what we all anticipate to be a vital and urgent motion picture.”
Producer Andrew Lauren, who is producing alongside D.J. Gugenheim for Andrew Lauren Productions, added, “Brady’s third feature,The Brutalist, is a continuation of his unique interpretation of major historical moments of the past century.”
Also producing is Brian Young for Three Six Zero, Trevor Matthews and Nick Gordon for Brookstreet Pictures, with Christine Vachon, Pamela Koffler, and David Hinojosa of Killer Films are set as executive producers.
Filming is set to begin in January 2021, with part of the film shooting in Poland. Also starring in the stacked ensemble are Isaach De Bankolé (Black Panther), Alessandro Nivola (American Hustle), Raffey Cassidy (The Killing Of A Sacred Deer) and Stacy Martin (Nymphomaniac). It certainly sounds like an impressive cast and prestigious premise, but it’s somewhat of an odd pivot for Corbet, an actor-turned-filmmaker who made waves with the acclaimed but divisiveVox Lux. You’d think he would follow up with something more risky and exciting than an arthouse postwar drama, but perhapsThe Brutalistcould be that.
