Dispatches

January 30, 2026

Photographs by MATT BARNES
Interviews by MATT MAYTUM

Patrick Dempsey is used to working at high speed, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that his new TV show – Memory of a Killer – came together so fast. ‘It was very quick,’ he tells Hollywood Authentic from New York. ‘So I got a call – I think it was maybe on the Tuesday, and they were like, ‘You’ve got to read this real quick. You have this offer on this project, and they need to make an announcement right away.’ So I read the scripts, and I liked it. I found the world really intriguing – the character and the dynamic and certainly the action aspect of it – it was a much darker character than I’ve had the opportunity to play. I spoke with the writers. I spoke with the producer. And then I said, ‘Yeah, let’s go for it.’’

Memory of a Killer, Odeya Rush, Patrick Dempsey, Porsche, Tag Heuer

Based on a 2003 Belgian film (which was itself adapted from a novel), Memory of a Killer stars Dempsey as an unassuming suburban dad and widower, who leads a double life as a sharp-suited, sharp-shooting assassin in NYC. And while juggling two existences might’ve already been complex enough, Angelo Doyle/Flannery (depending on which life he’s living) is also suffering from early onset Alzheimer’s, compromising his memory. ‘What I liked about it was certainly the character flaw – the aspect of dealing with someone who has early onset Alzheimer’s,’ considers Dempsey. ‘I thought it was really quite interesting. And then on top of that, this double life that he’s leading.’

The challenge of digging into those three facets of the character was a big part of the appeal for Dempsey. ‘You want to create a life in suburbia, and then you want to be able to play the vulnerability of losing your power and your faculties,’ he says. The hitman side of the character, in particular, offered the opportunity to flex a different muscle. ‘For me, what was appealing was to play the assassin, and to get an opportunity to do all the action,’ he smiles. ‘I don’t get that opportunity very often. So it was something different for me to go and do, and to show a different side of my nature.’

Though Angelo is a morally murky character, there’s a thrill to being able to play someone so slickly competent with such a dangerous skill-set. ‘You’re playing make-believe,’ he beams.

‘There’s nothing better than that. It goes back to when you were a kid, running around and doing all that stuff. Now you get to do it as an adult with all the great toys.’ Indeed, there’s almost a Batman element to the character as he leaves his home life, where he poses as a photocopier salesman, and drives off in his extremely practical, family-friendly vehicle, only to head to his hideout where there’s a Porsche, weaponry and hitman-appropriate attire waiting for him. ‘We start off in suburbia, and then we go into the Batcave, and we show the audience who he really is… That was fun for me to play, too.’

The role also allows Dempsey to tap into his own dual life – alongside his acting career, he’s been a successful racing driver, and brings some of those skills to Memory of a Killer’s car stunts. ‘The whole sequence with the Porsche going through the parking garage was something that I got to do, and it was really a lot of fun,’ he explains. ‘That’s really one of the reasons why I did it – to be able to, in my 60s, become an action actor… I love all of that.’ Dempsey may have turned 60 earlier this month, but he’s relaxed about strolling into this new decade. ‘I think going into my 50s was much harder than now going into my 60s,’ he considers. ‘I’ve come to terms with this next chapter… I hope I can just stay physically active, and be able to continue to work and enjoy life, and have a nice balance between the two. And you don’t take things as seriously.’

Talking of balance, Dempsey has managed to balance his passion for acting and racing, which he still participates in. After achieving key motorsports goals in 2015 like taking part in the World Endurance Championship, being on the podium at Le Mans, and winning in Japan and Fuji, Dempsey reached a turning point. ‘It was a tremendous sacrifice to my career and to my personal life,’ he says. ‘But then once I achieved those goals, there was a deep psychological turning point where I was like, ‘OK, now I can move on and do the next thing.’ The pressure was immense that year, and now I do it just for fun and the psychological, therapeutic benefits of it.’

Ongoing relationships with Porsche and Tag Heuer mean that he continues to have ‘these incredible adventures’. And, as he explains, it’s not like these twin passions don’t cross over. ‘There are amazing similarities,’ he says of acting and racing. ‘If you look at the car itself as sort of like the scripts – it’s what you drive – your engineer is the director. Your team principal is the producer. And the crews – the chemistry that you need to have, to have the right focus and the right energy, is very similar.’ The camaraderie and physicality also complement the two disciplines, as does the ‘meditative aspect’. ‘It’s the mind control… being present; being focused on what’s in front of you; being aware of what’s happening around you… it’s very much about being present.’

To return to a key theme of Memory of a Killer, Dempsey says while he hasn’t been directly impacted by Alzheimer’s in his own life, he could strongly relate to Angelo’s role as a caregiver (Angelo looks after his brother, who has a much further advanced condition than his own). Dempsey founded the Dempsey Center in 2008, which offers cancer patients treatment at no cost. ‘It’s very similar in that sense of, what does it mean to be a caregiver, and the pressures of that?’ he says. ‘I think it’s the most satisfying work in my life, outside of my family,’ he adds of the Center. ‘When you’re working with a group of people for the benefit of someone else, there is nothing better. And that’s really ultimately, I think, the meaning of life – it’s when you are here to serve.’

As for what’s around the next corner for his career, his future goals are clear and modest. ‘I think it’s just working with good material and really good directors,’ he says. ‘And just to continue to be a working actor…’

Memory of a Killer airs Mondays at 9/8c on FOX, next day on Hulu and is coming to Prime Video in the UK and Ireland in February
Dempsey wears: (black suit) Garrison Bespoke (suit), The Row (shoes), Eton (shirt); (corduroy suit) Garrison Bespoke (suit and shirt), Barrett (shoes). Styling is by Marc Andrew Smith

hollywood authentic, greg williams, hollywood authentic magazine

JAY KELLY PREMIERE

January 23, 2026

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Interviews by JANE CROWTHER

The team behind Noah Bambach’s Hollywood comedy talk dessert, watching their own movies and the loneliness of a movie star.

When Hollywood Authentic sits down with the cast of Jay Kelly and their writer-director in a suite at the Excelsior on Venice’s Lido we wonder why there’s no cheesecake on the table. At the heart of their film, the titular movie star, played by George Clooney, has an existential crisis during a jaunt across Europe with his longtime manager (Adam Sandler), his publicist (Laura Dern) and his hair and MUA (Emily Mortimer). On his rider everywhere he goes: a slice of vanilla cheesecake.

Adam Sandler, Billy Crudup, Emily Mortimer, George Clooney, Jay Kelly, Jim Broadbent, Laura Dern, Noah Baumbach

‘No cheesecake,’ Mortimer laughs. Also, no Clooney, who has excused himself from Venice Film Festival with illness after soldiering on to walk the premiere red carpet with Greg Williams. ‘It stinks,’ sighs Sandler of his buddy’s absence. Still, it’s clear the remaining team enjoy each other’s company and also the process of filming the movie across France and Italy as well as Hollywood. ‘I had the idea of a movie star going on a journey – going from Los Angeles into Europe, and specifically Italy, it was a compelling idea for me,’ Baumbach explains of the genesis of the project on which he partnered with Mortimer as co-writer after the two spent time together on White Noise. Mortimer was accompanying her kids, Sam and May Nivola, who were playing the on-screen children of Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig. ‘It wasn’t until Emily and I really got into it that I understood that making a movie about an actor is making a movie about performance and identity, and is a way to tell this story of how we’re all trying to meet ourselves as we go through life, and identify ourselves and who we are in all these different roles that we play in our lives.’

‘Noah came to me with a notion of this movie, but there was an awful lot of both of us that we shared,’ says Mortimer. ‘All the different ways in which living this pretend life can screw with your mind, and separate you from real life. And the kind of dedication and time that is required of you to do this job. Things like you see in the movie where you’re pretending to be in a family with a group of actors, and a fake kid, and a fake wife, and spending a lot of time getting to know each other in order to make the scene work and the film work. And, meanwhile, you’re leaving your real husband or wife or kids far, far away. So, yes, there was a lot that I could add, and also I spent a lot of time in Italy growing up. So I had lots of stories to tell about strange family holidays when I was a kid that tickled Noah.’

Of course, while Baumbach and Mortimer could pour their own experiences in their screenplay, it would only truly sing with the right person in the role of Jay, a charming, handsome movie star who has been famous and liked for decades. ‘It was clear that it should be somebody that the audience has a history with,’ says Baumbach. ‘Early on I felt it should be George. I’ve known him over the years a little bit, and always wanted to find something for him, and with him. I gave it to him, and the first thing he said after he read it, ‘You really wrote yourself into a corner with this, because there’s not many people who could play this part’. But George has that timeless quality, he feels like a movie star from any era. It was exciting doing it with him, because you’re asking the actor to reveal more and more of himself in the performance, while playing someone trying to hide.’

As Jay tries to hide, his erstwhile manager, Ron, tries to protect, juggling life with his wife (Greta Gerwig) and kids. Baumbach cast Adam Sandler, who has known Clooney for years in real life. ‘We played a few [basketball games] – we shot around a lot,’ says Sandler. ‘He’s a funny, decent person. But I never got to spend as much time as I did on the movie set, and being part of George’s family. You wish he was your concierge in real life. ‘What do I do today, George?’’ While the friendship with Clooney is replicated in real life, Sandler also recognises the movie star world of Jay Kelly from his own experiences.

‘When I see some movie star stuff that goes on in there, I’ve seen it in people I’ve worked with, or I’ve done it myself. In real life, I try to include my family and friends with what I do. But I will tell my family, ‘I’ve got a big day coming up, or a big couple of days in a row. I might not be as available to you’. And they’re cool with that. There was also a scene in the movie where I had to be very emotional, and Noah was cool enough to let my wife do the off-camera for me – a phone call – because I really had to feel things, and my wife and I have a nice closeness that it was allowing me to feel what I needed.’

Jay’s perfect life unravels after a meeting with an old friend, played by Billy Crudup. Having been mates as struggling actors, the two men have not seen each other for decades. They go for a drink and their lives are now starkly different, the emotions that are brought up by the reunion, charged. ‘There are so many features about [the film] that are about our lives, and about a very human expression of what it’s like to try to do this,’ says Crudup. ‘It’s probably a great analogue to everybody’s lives, you know? We make sacrifices in our work lives. Some of them are small, and some of them are catastrophic. You never know what’s going to come next, and how you’re going to manage your family in a certain period, or in a new portion of your life where you’re a parent, or you’ve lost a parent. All these different things were very relatable to me in the script. The first movie that I was in – as soon as the movie came out, I was hearing from people that I hadn’t heard from in a very long time. I can remember them not being very nice and that creates a kind of loneliness.’

Laura Dern as Jay’s exasperated publicist agrees; ‘The movie star is such a perfect choice of Emily and Noah, but it can be any career path. But simultaneously, this is not a drive of ego, but a shared drive that all of us here share, which is a deep love of cinema – it’s also this constant current in the film, with every choice, with every frame, with Noah’s work as well as Linus, our amazing cinematographer. You know, you’re falling in love with movies as you’re watching this cautionary tale about living the life of being in the movies.’

‘It’s not just a cautionary tale of how destructive pretending to be other people can be,’ Mortimer adds. ‘It’s also just innate to who we are as people – play-acting and pretending to be other people. And the fun of that, and the joy of that, and how much it can give to everybody.’ The film also shows a moment when Jay watches clips of his own films with an audience, seeing how his work affects other people. What is the experience for Mortimer when watching her own movies back?

‘I guess it’s just the same as looking at old photographs or something. You’re just like, ‘Oh my God, I looked so nice, and I was so young. What was I worrying about!’ For me, looking at old movies, I can’t really look at it in a way where I’m analysing my work as a professional – it does feel like a scrapbook or a photo album of your life somehow. And you mark your life through the movies that you make. You remember scenes from your own life through seeing the film and it gives me the sense of time passing in the blink of an eye.’

‘I certainly enjoyed being a lot skinnier back then,’ Sandler admits of watching his back catalogue. ‘My family will watch an old movie of mine, and I’ll walk in. I never sit and watch it for too long, but I do remember what happened, and what was going on – maybe even that day.’ He keenly remembers a specific day when asked what’s on his own rider (not cheesecake). ‘One movie I walked onto maybe 20 years ago, and it was too hot on the stage. And I said, ‘Where the hell is the air conditioning?’ I was yelling about it being too hot, and I’m sweating, and I can’t think straight. And now every time one of my productions is going, I step on the set, and it’s like 62 degrees, and everyone’s shivering. And I say, ‘What’s going on in here?’ And they’re like, ‘You said…’’ He chuckles. ‘That’s my cheesecake.’

Jay Kelly is in cinemas, and streaming on Netflix now

Dispatches

RAMI MALEK

November 21, 2025

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by Jane Crowther

Greg Williams joins Rami Malek as he premieres Nuremberg in London, and considers the all-star acting relationships that create on-screen drama.

When Greg Williams’ meets Rami Malek as he prepares for the premiere of his latest film Nuremberg at Claridges in London, he tinkles the keys of the piano sitting in his suite. In his Valentino tux, he matches the keyboard. In his latest film the Oscar-winner plays US army psychiatrist Dr Douglas Kelley, a real-life shrink who assessed the Nazi leaders on trial in the titular city in 1945. Among his patients was Hermann Göring (Russell Crowe) and the conversations the two men have helped unravel Hitler’s high command and revealed the horrors of the Holocaust. It’s a film that shows in unblinking detail the footage of the liberation of the concentration camps and asks questions about how men can commit such diabolic acts. In a world currently in turmoil, Malek sees the modern-day echoes in the chain of events depicted on screen, and the themes the film explores.

‘What it reminds you is, this could happen at any time in history – history does repeat itself, and it will repeat itself. I think the lesson that hopefully people get is what we do when things like this happen in our world? Are we complicit? Are we silent? Is it a call to action? Do we speak up? For me, this film is a way of speaking up. It’s a reminder. Every time we’re screening the film, I’m getting notes from people who are saying, ‘I’m sorry, I couldn’t make it after. I had to wrestle with some things in my mind.’ I think that’s very meaningful. I love when things are entertaining, but I’m very proud of the message that this film tells. I’m really proud of it.’

Key to the film is the cat-and-mouse gameplay between Kelley and Göring. Malek had quite the scene partner in Crowe. ‘I absolutely loved working with Russell, because he’s a titan,’ he says as he walks through the hotel to a waiting car, ready to take him to Leicester Square for the premiere. ‘One would think that he could have a massive ego but he was very generous with me. After our first take, he came up to me, and he said, ‘You’re bringing more to this character than I had seen on the page’. He didn’t have to do that. And I couldn’t tell if that was him just, you know, playing into the character, of wanting to be a bit charming and intoxicating. Or if that was actually just Russell being Russell, and putting his guard down, and saying, ‘Hey, let’s jump into this together, because it’s a powerful story, and we want to bring our A-game’. And we did. There were moments where it was incredibly tense between the two of us. Each take was different. That’s what you expect from someone at his level. I think we just raised our game. We all knew we had to.’

I absolutely loved working with Russell, because he’s a titan, one would think that he could have a massive ego but he was very generous with me. After our first take, he came up to me, and he said, “You’re bringing more to this character than I had seen on the page.” He didn’t have to do that

Malek takes a spin in the hotel’s revolving door for fun before making it to the car. Once settled in the back seat he recalls working with Leo Woodall, co-starring as a German interpreter with hidden secrets. ‘James Vanderbilt, our director, wanted us to meet because we were going to spend so much time together. It started with a lot of banter. I was able to take the piss with him – back and forth, you know, as a Brit. But I quickly realised that we were going to get along very well, and we did. We had each other’s backs through every moment. He has this effortless charm.’ Also on-board, Michael Shannon, playing supreme court justice, Robert Jackson. ‘Shannon and I have known each other for years, so that was an easy relationship to spring back into. He works so damn hard. He loves what he does to a degree that I wonder if there’s another actor who appreciates acting as much as he does. But he is one of the funniest people I’ve also come across. No one expects it, but he’s got this dry wit and charm. And I think he should have his own stand-up routine.’ Despite personal admiration and friendships, each working relationship with each actor was different.

‘Russell could easily, in between takes, jump into a story about him visiting the Sistine Chapel, and them treating him as if he was Maximus, and we’d all be laughing. You’d get those great moments of charm, and that would, in a way, affect how we all related to him as Hermann Göring. You could see how someone could be so charming, even sitting across from him in that uniform. And it would remind you that evil doesn’t just get disguised as a certain uniform or a certain belief system. And then, in contrast, as funny as Shannon is, I know to leave him alone between takes. I have a sense that he wants to be in his personal space. You give that actor their space. And then you come in and bring something new to each take, which he did every time we were together. With Leo, we were able to joke around quite a bit because of the nature of our relationship. But then he ended up showing up to a surprise birthday party of mine, and you realise that relationship is going to continue for quite some time.’

With its subject matter, stellar cast and handsome production values, Nuremberg has something of an old-fashioned quality about it that recalls Kelly’s Heroes or A Bridge Too Far. Malek agrees that it’s the sort of film, in an established-IP landscape, that doesn’t get made very often these days. ‘Oppenheimer, on paper, is a film that shouldn’t be made, but was. That’s the same casting director we had – John Papsidera – who has assembled all of these great actors together. I think when you have people who gravitate to it from the acting perspective we had on board, but also designers – Eve Stewart, who’s an Academy award-winning production designer, cinematographer Dariusz Wolski, who has done all of Ridley Scott’s movies and the Pirates of the Caribbean films…. you get a sense that the film is timely, urgent.

These people could go and be doing anything at this point. The reason that they chose this is because it had something special behind it. We’ve heard of the Nuremberg trials, but we didn’t know that this relationship existed between a psychiatrist, who was charged with discovering if these 22 Nazis were fit for trial. And that’s fascinating in and of itself.’

Malek was moved by the history of the project himself. ‘There are moments when we’re watching the footage of the atrocity in that courtroom. It was played for us for the first time. It’s gut-wrenching. James Vanderbilt built the film like a thriller, and then he gives you this gut-punch as well. I find it odd to use the word, with Nuremberg, “entertaining”. That might sound like a very strange juxtaposition, but it exists, and I think that’s what makes this film especially powerful.’

As the car approached the red carpet on Leicester Square, Malek admits he still gets excited stepping out into the glare of the spotlight, amid crowds of shouting fans and media, despite having debuted numerous films in the city. ‘I used to get nervous. I’ve now found a way to just chill out. Have a nice bath, a cup of tea. But it’s exciting. I’ll find this moment – as we’re about to step out of this vehicle into all of the madness – I will find the joy in it.’ He looks at the crowds waving pictures to sign and chanting his name. ‘There’s a lot of love…’

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

Nuremberg is in cinemas now

Dispatches

AMANDA SEYFRIED

September 5, 2025

Amanda Seyfried, Lewis Pullman, Mona Fastvold, The Testament of Ann Lee, Thomasin McKenzie

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

Amanda Seyfried let loose while making her unconventional biopic of Ann Lee, the 18th century leader of religious group, the Shakers – famous for their convulsions, dancing and vocalisation during their worship. Born in Manchester, Ann experienced visions, believed herself to be the second incarnation of Christ and was radical in her teachings. In Mona Fastvold’s film, The Testament Of Ann Lee (which was co-created with The Brutalist writer-director Brady Corbet), Lee is portrayed by Seyfried as a force of nature, inspiring followers and challenging societal norms. When she prays she and the cast dance and move while singing original Shaker hymns, grunting, keening and screaming in a kind of orgiastic ritual.

‘This did feel like an opportunity where there were just no tethers to anything,’ Seyfried told the press in Venice as the film debuted there. ‘Basically, I follow Mona into the light and anything goes because there’s so much freedom, and the only threat is to not use that freedom to your advantage as an artist to go as far deep as you can go to make the craziest sounds. I’ve never been let loose in this way.’

‘The reason I was able to face these challenges as an artist, was because I felt completely protected, held up and surrounded by loving artists, and in a place where everybody knew the value of making this, and understood Mona’s vision. I have to say it, this was incredibly rare and might never happen again.”

Unlike Ann, Seyfried admits she wasn’t always sure of herself. ‘I kept saying [to Mona], ‘go with somebody English,’ because the accent seemed so hard. But she believed in me, and so I believed in me, and here we are.’ Fastvold told journalists that her star possessed the necessary wildness to inhabit the role. ‘Amanda has a lot of power. She’s very strong, a wonderful mother, and she’s a little mad. I knew she could access those things. I saw Amanda was ready to go full force.’

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

The Testament of Ann Lee premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival
Released in cinemas at a later date
Amanda Seyfried wears Prada and Tiffany & Co. jewels

Dispatches

EMILY BLUNT

September 4, 2025

Benny Safdie, Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Ryan Bader, The Smashing Machine

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

Though Benny Safdie’s Venice hit The Smashing Machine centres on the experience of real-life UFC champ Mark Kerr, the key to the story – according to the actor portraying him, Dwayne Johnson – is the relationship between Mark and his girlfriend, Dawn Staples, played with a perma-tan and acrylic nails by Emily Blunt. The bond between Johnson and Blunt is also integral to the project. It was clear to see as Greg Williams joined the duo and Safdie for a pre-premiere toast at the St. Regis before riding across the Venice lagoon to debut their work at the festival. In the Grande Salle, the film was received with a fifteen-minute standing ovation and praise for both leads’ performances.

Having become ‘best friends’ while making the action-adventure Jungle Cruise, the two actors discussed next projects, with Blunt encouraging Johnson to follow his heart and ambition in breaking out of blockbusters. When they began to work on Kerr’s biopic, Blunt admits she found Johnson’s physical and emotional transformation ‘spooky’. ‘It was one of the most extraordinary things watching him disappear completely,’ she told the press on the Lido earlier in the day. Blunt’s metamorphosis was equally impressive as she spent time with her real-life counterpart. ‘I got to know Dawn well and she was very generous with her story with me,’ Blunt said. ‘There was a deep profound love and devotion they had for each other amidst an impossible environment.’

Safdie explained the process he went through with both actors to achieve the level of authenticity he was looking for. ‘Dwayne, Emily and I kept thoughts like, ‘What is it like to really be Mark Kerr? What is it like to really be Dawn Staples?’ We wanted to empathise with these characters in a way that felt like our own feelings. I ended up calling this a kind of Radical Empathy. First, because empathy should be cool, and second, because I wanted this movie to exist as a memory for everyone who watches it.’

The film will surely live in the memory of voting bodies come awards season – with Blunt entering the conversation again for another perfectly essayed performance.

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

The Smashing Machine premiered at the Venice Film Festival
Released in cinemas 3 October
Read our review here
Emily wears Tamara Ralph gown with Tiffany & Co. jewellery

Dispatches

NOOMI RAPACE

September 4, 2025

Mother, Noomi Rapace, Teona Strugar Mitevska, Venice Film Festival 2025, Hotel Cipriani

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Interview by JANE CROWTHER

When Noomi Rapace arrives at the Hotel Cipriani pool in Venice it seems she’s channeling her most recent role as nun and modern-day saint, Mother Teresa, in monochrome menswear. In Macedonian writer-director Teona Strugar Mitevska’s biopic, Mother, which looks as the Albanian-born nun’s pre-celebrity life in 1948 as she attempts to start a new order in Calcutta and wrestles with self-doubt and the issue of abortion, Rapace is seen wearing a black-and-white habit throughout, emoting through a wimple that she describes as ‘acting through a little hole. It’s just my face, and my body is covered’. It’s a role that required her to look at herself as well as the life of a world-famous woman. ‘I didn’t know anything about the person, just saw her with different political leaders, and Lady Di,’ she tells Hollywood Authentic. ‘And then when I got asked to play her, I started doing research. I started reading her letters. Her own words were really kind of the route into understanding her. You know what really surprised me? The eternal pain that she was carrying, and how much she was struggling with her faith, with her beliefs, with her own feeling that she was not doing enough; feeling that she was not worthy. All this self-doubt and pain. She said once, ‘If I ever become a saint, it will surely be one of darkness.’ And that’s fascinating. Also, we need to put into consideration that she’s a woman in a man’s world. She was writing letters, and calling the Vatican for years, insisting, and getting them to allow her – to give her permission – to start this vision, this mission that she had, this calling that had been given from God.’

The film explores Teresa’s inflexibility and her ambition – her single-mindedness in getting her calling accomplished. As an artist, does Rapace relate on some level to that drive and ambition that’s required to succeed in acting? ‘Yeah, the ambition and how determined she was. Coming from this small, isolated, quiet small farm in Sweden – I had no access. I had no connections. I didn’t know anyone in the world outside of the farm. I left when I was 15, and went on a journey on my own; Teresa left when she was 16, and went to join the Loreto Sisters in Ireland. I can find a connecting tissue between us in this very stubborn, determined fight for something. But also a lot of self-doubt. I’m very, very hard on myself. I grew up carrying a lot of pain, and a lot of my journey is very much to find peace, and to be accepting myself, and to forgive and be grateful, and to not be too hard. Teresa was very much ‘no exceptions – rules are for all’ – this was very much me when I was younger. You might sleep two hours, but you still go to the gym. I couldn’t understand people being like, ‘But I’m tired.’’ The actor smiles and admits to being kinder to herself these days. ‘That comes with success and aging. I love ageing. It’s been so good to me,’ she says. ‘I feel so much more at peace, and open. I think I was running away from things for many, many years, or running towards something. And now I’m really practising being in the now, and being in the moment.’

Success with films such as The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Sherlock Holmes and Prometheus have also allowed her to take on films such as Mother, lending her name as well as her skills to smaller indie films and working with female directors. ‘I’ve been an actress since I was 16. I worked with so many men; amazing male directors, amazing male stars. But it’s always one woman in a group of men, and the imbalance has been shocking. How do you pave the way? How do you create a field – a stage – for women to practise their skills? I think it’s so important to make conscious choices. Because it’s so easy to take what’s in front of you, a more safe route. And when you work with a first-time director, for example, you do take a risk. So you need to step in, and be like, ‘OK, I commit to this. I’ll stand there with you. I’ll be frontline with you, and we’ll carry this together.’’

Rapace describes the robust relationship of questioning she had with her director on Mother – a freedom she says she might have labelled her a ‘difficult’ with other collaborators. ‘I’ve seen male stars coming in and being really difficult, not showing up, being late, and coming in and being really negative. And then I come in and be like, ‘I actually feel like we should look at this line, because it doesn’t really resonate with what we did yesterday’, it’s like, ‘OK, we really don’t have time for this, Noomi’,’ she laughs. ‘I mean, look at our history, women are witches. We are complicated. We are troublemakers if we come in and cause problems. But I feel a lot of hope. I feel a shift. There are such incredible female directors and producers and production companies. Look at Margot Robbie. Look at Emma Stone’s company. Female actors creating a space, and giving opportunities for other females. I get really moved by it, to be honest.’

Mother is providing space for more female stories she says; ‘It’s a feminist movie because we’re shining a light on a complex human who happens to be a woman’. It’s also an account of a pro-life woman that is pertinent to today’s erosion of female reproductive rights. ‘I was questioning Teona. I was like, ‘Why do you want to have this in it?’ She’s like, ‘Because this conversation is needed’. The fact that still today there are countries where women cannot drive, women cannot vote, women belong to the men, women cannot divorce – I mean, what the Fuck?’

For Rapace, living with the complex Teresa while filming on location in India was a draining experience. ‘We shot in the actual footsteps of Mother Teresa. We shot in the slums, the schools, in the spaces she created. I have a hard time finding words that match the feelings of what I experienced being there. But I felt like I was sort of peeling off layers and layers of myself. Towards the end, I was crying every day. It was just so beautiful to experience it – In the end, I wasn’t even entirely sure what was me, and what was Teresa. I came back to London after filming. I had two weeks, and I was so lost, walking around in my house, just in a circle like a caged animal. And then slowly I started finding my footing, and finding ground again. And then this great sensation of feeling grateful for what I’ve learned from doing this movie, and allowing this person to live in me. Even though I don’t really like or agree with her, it was a really challenging and powerful experience.’

As an actor she admits to being ‘obsessed with the human psyche’ and an advocate of therapy. ‘I’m fascinated with how we become who we are, and what tools we are given from an early age. How big is our emotional, psychological toolbox, you know? I’m a firm believer that you can go pretty fucking far in your own healing. I’m working on myself, you know? I do think that it’s important to protect yourself, but also to keep reminding yourself of “What is my journey? What am I interested in? And not what they want me to do, and not what pays me the best.’ So the moments when I close my eyes, and I listen to myself, and I can’t hear my own voice – that’s been moments that it’s like, ‘t’s time to change. I need to change something here, and redirect my life route, to start hearing my own voice again. Because it’s the only one I have’.

That voice wants to work with Andrea Arnold, Kathyn Bigalow, Tilda Swinton, Molly Manning Walker and Chloe Zhao and has taken her on projects such as Maria Martinez Bayona’s This Is The End with Rebecca Hall, which she just wrapped on. ‘I came off set every day just filled with joy,’ she enthuses. ‘It questions ‘what is life for?’ and holding onto youth.’ And she’s completed Hot Spot with Agnieszka Smoczynska. ‘She describes the movie as a poem,’ Rapace says of her director. ‘She works with sound, images, symbols. She’s a very, very special human being. We did one scene – I think maybe 20 takes – and she just kept pushing me. I felt at the end I was a sort of jellyfish. I didn’t know what I was doing, but I was completely allowing her to guide me. She’s an extraordinary human. I loved it!’

Mother premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and will be released at a later date
Noomi wears Ami and Messika jewels. Styling by Jonathan Huguet

Dispatches

DWAYNE JOHNSON

September 3, 2025

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

The transformation of Dwayne Johnson into UFC champ Mark Kerr isn’t just in performance – though that’s revelatory with Johnson’s best dramatic work to date. It’s also about evolving as an actor and public figure. As he arrived at the Venice Film Festival to premiere The Smashing Machine, which he also produced, he told journalists that he’d wanted to take on a role like this for some time and that he and his director, Benny Safdie, and co-star, Emily Blunt had discussed the process for a while. Blunt, he said, had encouraged him to make the leap to such a challenging role.

“The three of us have talked for a very long time about, when you’re in Hollywood — as we all know, it had become about box office,’ the star of Fast & Furious, Jumanji and Moana said. ‘And you chase the box office, and the box office can be very loud and it can become very resounding and it can push you into a category and into a corner. This is your lane and this is what you do and this is what Hollywood wants you to do.”

‘I looked around a few years ago and I started to think, you know, am I living my dream or am I living other people’s dreams? You come to that recognition and I think you can either fall in line — ‘Well, it’s status quo, things are good, I don’t want to rock the boat’ — or go, I want to live my dreams now and do what I wanna do and tap into the stuff that I want to tap into, and have a place finally to put all this stuff that I’ve experienced in the past that I’ve shied away from.’

In the A24 film Johnson charts a three year period in Kerr’s career when he was fighting an addiction to painkillers, defining the now-huge UFC world and riding a rocky road with his girlfriend, Dawn (played by his Jungle Cruise co-star and friend, Blunt). He shows a vulnerability audiences haven’t seen from the actor before in a performance that already has awards heat. Johson brought the real Kerr to the festival with him and told the press that the process of playing the fighter had changed his life. And he thinks that the film will offer something to audiences too – not just athletes and sportspeople. ‘It’s not about the wins or the losses … it’s also a film about what happens when winning becomes the enemy. And I think we can all relate to that pressure.’

Winning might be something Johnson has to get comfortable with as we head into awards season given the glowing reviews he’s received out of the festival. The star was greeted rapturiously by crowds on the premiere red carpet after he travelled there with Greg Williams – and the film received a 15 minute ovation, reducing the actor to tears. ‘I’ve been scared to go deep and go intense and go raw until now, until I’ve had this opportunity,’ Johnson admitted. Facing the fear looks like it was worth it – it’s a knockout turn.

The Smashing Machine premiered at the Venice Film Festival and is in cinemas 3 October
Dwayne Johnson wears Prada and Chopard

Dispatches

ALICE DIOP

September 3, 2025

Alice Diop, Fragments for Venus, Venice Film Festival 2025, Women’s Tales

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Interview by JANE CROWTHER

MIU MIU’S WOMEN’S TALES: FRAGMENTS FOR VENUS
The last time director Alice Diop presented a film in Venice with Saint Omer in 2022 she won the Grand Jury Prize and with the Luigi De Laurentiis Lion of the Future award. She was also overwhelmed. ‘It actually took years to revisit that experience, and to digest it,’ she admits over tea and biscuits in the Baglioni Hotel, perched on the Grand Canal. She returned to the Venice Film Festival to serve on the First Film jury, but this year she presents her short film, Fragments for Venus as part of Miu Miu’s twice a year Women’s Tales strand. ‘This film is as important as Saint Omer. I don’t see a difference between short films, feature films, etcetera. But the stakes are lower in that this is a film that is going to live its life. It doesn’t have to make a big splash coming into the industry. So the only stress is really whether what I’ve put into the film will be heard. The moment you let your work go, there is a lot of anxiety and fear around that. I’m certainly not in the same state that I was in with Saint Omer, which I think I was actually in a state of disassociation going into that premiere. This time, I’m welcoming the pleasure and joy of presenting a film.’

Her film explores the way the Black female form has been portrayed in worlds of art throughout history, set to the powerful poem ‘Voyage of the Sable Venus’ by Robin Coste Lewis. As the stanzas list the titles of different works of art an actress (Saint Omer’s Kayije Kagame) wanders a gallery looking at the pieces. Later, the film tracks a young poet (Sephora Pondi) as she finds inspiration in the streets of Bed-Stuy in Brooklyn. Both actors wear garments from Miu Miu, but that’s the only involvement the fashion house had in creating the project, says Diop, noting she’d been asked to participate numerous times but only found the time was right recently. ‘The only reason that I agreed to do this project is because there was absolutely no directive other than using some clothing from the latest Miu Miu collection. So it was an absolutely free commission. I had total freedom to create and think. It’s not enough for me to simply respond to a commission. To make a film, I need to be driven by an imperious necessity – a really strong desire. Eventually they came at a perfect moment where this film provided the ideal occasion to go further with things that I was reflecting on already.’

Diop worked with a translator, Nicholas Elliott, while on a residency in New York and it was he who found and translated Coste Lewis’ work for the writer/director. It was the title poem from her collection Voyage of the Sable Venus that particularly struck a chord. ‘It revisits the entire history of art and the construction of the gaze, and shows how the Black female body has been objectified and fetishised throughout that history. It’s a highly political poem and very experimental, but also very simple. And it truly was instrumental in inspiring this film which questions the representation of the Black female body, and of trying to use cinema as a way to repair the deformation of these images. Kayije’s beauty, her way of moving – in contrast to this great, classical, European art – creates meaning. And I hope it allows the viewer to see the way that we have been forced to accept a certain type of beauty, and exclude others. So to see her beauty in contrast with this art, interrogates the absence of certain beauties. As for Sephora Pondi, the power of her body, her beauty, her presence – it allows us to open up, and free the idea of the Venus, and to offer Sephora and all these women that we encounter in the streets of Brooklyn the opportunity to be Venuses.’

Diop has been instrumental in changing perceptions of Black women in cinema through Saint Omer – so does she feel more hopeful about the representation she is seeing in today’s art? ‘My expectation and my hope is that there will be more of us who have the means and the audience to revisit these deforming, secular visions. There aren’t many of us now. I would like for there to be more. For instance, at a major festival like the Venice Biennale, I’m not sure if there’s even one racialised filmmaker this year. There’s maybe more in the fine arts happening. Cinema still has a lot of work to do. So I’m not sure I would say that I’m confident. But, in any case, I’m hard at work, and I expect to be supported in my work by more colleagues – all of us driven by this collective effort.’ She’s currently working on a new secret project but she smiles enegmatically when asked what we might expect from it. ‘I am certainly at work, but it’s still too fragile to really talk about…’ she says as she disappears to get ready for her premiere.

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Interview by JANE CROWTHER

Women’s Tales: Fragments for Venus premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival
Alice Diop wears Miu Miu

Dispatches

JUDE LAW

September 2, 2025

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by JANE CROWTHER

Jude Law arrived on the Venice Lido to premiere his latest role as Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Olivier Assayas‘ taut political thriller The Wizard of the Kremlin and shook off suggestions that the modern-day ‘Tsar’ might not like his spot-on portrayal. He told the press. ‘I felt confident, in the hands of Olivier and the script, that this story was going to be told intelligently and with nuance and consideration. We weren’t looking for controversy for controversy’s sake.’

The film is based on Giuliano da Empoli’s 2022 bestselling book by the same name, and fictionally tracks Putin’s rise to power through the eyes of a theatre director-turned TV producer-turned spin doctor, Vadim Baranov (Paul Dano). A created character based on real people surrounding Putin, Baranov relates his story to an American reporter visiting Moscow in 2019 (Jeffrey Wright), explaining the manipulation of Russian voters via vertical power and the background to world events (the Ukraine revolution, the sinking of the Kursk submarine, internet sabotage). Along the way Baranov betrays friends and lovers – including Tom Sturridge’s billionaire and Alicia Vikandar’s performance artist.

Law wears a wig and light prosthetics, and adopts the gait, expressions and mannerisms of Putin so that it’s difficult for audiences to tell the difference between historical footage and the actor. ‘The tricky side to me was that the public face we see gives very, very little away. There has been a term for him and that is ‘the man without a face’. There’s a mask. Understandably, Olivier would want me to portray this or that in a scene with a certain emotion, and I felt the conflict of trying to show very little.’

After The Wizard of the Kremlin premiere where the film received a 12 minute standing ovation, the actor was back to his open, real self as Greg Williams joined him on a boat heading to the AmfAR gala. At the event Law presented director Julian Schnabel with a tribute award of inspiration.

The Wizard of the Kremlin premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and will be released at a future date
Jude Law wears Brunello Cucinelli

Dispatches

PAUL MESCAL

May 24, 2025

hollywood authentic, cannes dispatch, cannes film festival, greg williams, hollywood authentic

Josh O'Connor, Oliver Hermanus, Paul Mescal, Peter Mark Kendall, The History of Sound

Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Interview by JANE CROWTHER

History of Sound actor/producer Paul Mescal brings his period romance to Cannes as he reflects on masculinity and love.

When Paul Mescal last came to Cannes he was arriving off the back of hit TV show Normal People and wowed the festival with his delicate portrayal of a father in crisis in Aftersun in 2011. Now he’s bringing a film to the Croisette in the wake of All of Us Strangers and Gladiator II – and as a producer. Oliver Hermanus’ The History of Sound, based on Ben Shattock’s short story, follows music student Lionel (Mescal) who falls for fellow undergrad David (Josh O’Connor) and embarks on a folk song collecting expedition through 1919 rural New England.

The role is another nuanced role from Mescal who says that cinema is shifting from dated male stereotypes. ‘It’s ever shifting,’ he says. ‘I think maybe in cinema we’re moving away from the traditional, alpha, leading male characters. I don’t think the film is defining or attempting to redefine masculinity, I think it is being very subjective to the relationship between Lionel and David.’

He and O’Connor have followed a similar trajectory in their careers and knew each other before getting on set together, which only added to the actors’ ability to get into character and craft a heartbreaking love story. ‘We’ve known each other for about five years and we were definitely friendly so that foundation of safety and play was there, but that relationship really deepened in the three or four weeks we were filming. I felt very lucky that myself and Josh knew each other well enough to begin with but we had a canvas to keep painting on during the filming process.’

The journey to showing the film to audiences at Cannes has taken a number of years, with Mescal first reading the script at the age of 24, filming at 28 and presenting it in France at the age of 29. For the actor it’s been a rewarding experience to track a project from start to finish both in front of, and behind, the camera. And the end result is a feature that explores love without words. ‘What I found so moving about the screenplay is that it’s never really described in words, it’s described in actions and things you don’t see … That’s something I’ve learned in my own life, kindness is wildly underrated in romantic relationships and should be celebrated.’

The History of Sound premiered at the 78th Cannes Film Festival and is out in cinemas now
Read our review here

Dispatches

PATRICK DEMPSEY

January 30, 2026

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JAY KELLY PREMIERE

January 23, 2026

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RAMI MALEK

November 21, 2025

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AMANDA SEYFRIED

September 5, 2025

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EMILY BLUNT

September 4, 2025

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NOOMI RAPACE

September 4, 2025

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DWAYNE JOHNSON

September 3, 2025

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ALICE DIOP

September 3, 2025

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JUDE LAW

September 2, 2025

Dispatches

PAUL MESCAL

May 24, 2025

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