With his recent biopics Jackie and Spencer, Pablo Larraín has explored the lives of powerful and influential women. He’ll go back to that territory again with a film on famed opera singer Maria Callas, and he’s just landed a huge star in Angelina Jolie.
According to THR, Jolie will star as Maria Callas in Maria. Larraín will write and direct the movie about Callas and her final days in Paris, France before her death in 1977. The film will reunite Larraín with Spencer screenwriter, Steven Knight.
Interestingly, there’s a connection between this film’s subject and Jackie. Callas had a long-running affair with Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis before he eventually married Jackie Kennedy following her husband’s assassination.
“I take very seriously the responsibility to Maria’s life and legacy. I will give all I can to meet the challenge,” Jolie said in a statement. “Pablo Larraín is a director I have long admired. To be allowed the chance to tell more of Maria’s story with him, and with a script by Steven Knight, is a dream.”
Jolie was most recently seen in two films, Marvel’s Eternals and Those Who Wish Me Dead. She can be heard returning to voice Tigress in Kung Fu Panda 4, and is currently working on her sixth directorial feature, Without Blood.
