Christoph Waltz has signed up to play the iconic filmmaker Billy Wilder in the Stephen Frears directed ‘Billy Wilder and Me.’
A part coming-of-age story, part true-life portrait of the beloved Billy Wilder (Waltz), the film is set during the summer of 1977, when an innocent young woman begins working for the famed director and his screenwriter Iz Diamond on a Greek island during the filming of Fedora. When she follows Wilder to Germany to continue the shoot, she finds herself joining him on a journey of memory into the heart of his family history.
Based on Jonathan Coe’s much-loved 2020 book ‘Mr Wilder and Me’, Christopher Hampton is adapting for the big screen.
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Jeremy Thomas is producing alongside Reinhard Brundig and Christos V. Konstantakopoulos, who previously partnered with Thomas on Jim Jarmusch’s ‘Only Lovers Left Alive.’
Waltz stated: “Billy Wilder said ‘You have to have a dream so you can get up in the morning.’ A Stephen Frears movie from a Christopher Hampton script produced by Jeremy Thomas should do the trick for me.”
Filming is set to commence in the spring of 2023 in Greece, Munich and Paris. Casting of further principal roles will be announced shortly.
