Steven Soderbergh loves a good con. The director behind Out of Sight, the Ocean’s trilogy, and Logan Lucky explores the greedy side of the art world with The Christophers, a dark comedy led by the pairing of Ian McKellen and Michaela Coel.
The Christophers is built around a family inheritance, an artist’s legacy, and a chance at revenge. Written by Ed Solomon (Soderbergh’s No Sudden Move), the film centers on a plot to forge new paintings by a renowned artist before he dies, so his children can sell them and get the inheritance they are being denied.
The new trailer reveals the film to be a chamber comedy with a small handful of characters in tense, witty conversation in which every line has a double meaning or ulterior motive.
McKellen stars as aging artist Julian, with Coel as the forger Lori, plus James Corden and Jessica Gunning as the greedy children.
SYNOPSIS: Julian Sklar was once a star of London’s 1960s and 1970s pop art explosion, but he hasn’t painted in decades and has been broke for years. His two estranged children, desperate for an inheritance, hire Lori—an art restorer and former forger—to pose as a prospective assistant so she can access eight unfinished canvases stored deep in the vault. The plan is to finish them, tuck them back away, and have the works “discovered” after Julian’s death.
NEON will release The Christophers in NY and LA on April 10th, with a national expansion on April 17th.
