The Actor

The Actor (2025)

An unforgettable cinematic odyssey.

Paul Cole finds himself stranded in a mysterious small town with no memory of who he is or how he got here. As bits and pieces of his past slowly emerge, he attempts to find his way home, but time is slippery, appearances can't be trusted, and it's unclear which of his identities is real.

Date of release
2025-03-14
TMDB
6.1 / 10 (23)
Runtime
1h 38m
Genres
Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Director
Duke Johnson

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Based on: Memory

The Actor is a 2025 American crime mystery film directed by Duke Johnson from a screenplay he co-wrote with Stephen Cooney, based on the 2010 novel Memory by Donald E. Westlake. The film marks Johnson's solo directorial debut and his first live-action film. It stars André Holland and Gemma Chan in the lead roles. The supporting cast includes May Calamawy, Asim Chaudhry, Joe Cole, Fabien Frankel, Olwen Fouéré, Edward Hogg, Toby Jones, Youssef Kerkour, Simon McBurney, Tanya Reynolds, Tracey Ullman, and Scott Alexander Young.

Production

In 2015, director Duke Johnson and producer Abigail Spencer optioned the 2010 novel Memory by Donald E. Westlake. In 2019, actor Ryan Gosling received the script and then he and Johnson started developing the script together through the COVID-19 pandemic.

On April 12, 2021, it was reported that Neon had acquired North American distribution rights to the film and that Charlie Kaufman–who co-directed the 2015 film Anomalisa with Johnson–had joined the project as executive producer. The same day, Neon stated on their Twitter account that the film was set to be released in 2022.

On October 18, 2022, producer Abigail Spencer said in an interview with the website The Retaility that the film was in pre-production in Budapest and that André Holland and Gemma Chan were the leads. On October 29, 2022, FilmBook announced that actress Olwen Fouéré had joined the cast, which also included Tracey Ullman, May Calamawy, Tanya Reynolds, Simon McBurney, Edward Hogg, Asim Chaudhry, and Youssef Kerkour.

In an interview with the YouTube channel PIVOT DXB on March 13, 2023, Calamawy said that she played five different characters in the film.

On April 4, 2023, Neon announced that Ryan Gosling–who was originally attached to star as Paul Cole before being replaced by Holland–remained part of the film as an executive producer. Johnson later said that Gosling dropped out due to scheduling conflicts.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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