Adrien Brody & Rachel Zegler To Lead Karim Aïnouz’s ‘Last Dance’ With Ben Platt Co-Starring & Writing Original Music & ‘Evita’ Star Zegler Singing; FilmNation Launching For Cannes Market

Two-time Oscar winner Adrien Brody (The Brutalist) and Golden Globe winner Rachel Zegler (West Side Story) are set to star in Brazilian filmmaker Karim Aïnouz’s (Firebrand) upcoming father-daughter drama Last Dance.

Tony, Emmy, and Grammy winner Ben Platt (Dear Evan Hansen) will co-star in the film while also composing original music. Following her acclaimed Olivier-winning turn in Evita, Zegler is also set to perform the film’s original songs.

The screenplay was written by Emily Ziff Griffin and is based on her 2021 autobiographical New Yorker article, “The Last Dance with My Dad.” The project marks the first known feature role Brody has committed to since winning his second Academy Award for Best Actor for The Brutalist.

In Last Dance, “celebrated Broadway composer Elliot (Brody) invites his daughter Emma (Zegler) on a gay cruise through the Caribbean in 1991 — a dazzling, liberating world of music, celebration and chosen family where Emma, the only straight woman on board, experiences an unexpected first love with a young crew member. But beneath the joy and abandon, the AIDS crisis casts an ever-deepening shadow. As Elliot retreats from the devastating reality of his illness, father and daughter are forced to confront the unspoken truths between them. In the fleeting time they have left together, can they rediscover each other before the music finally fades?”

Production is being led by Fifth Season and Oscar-nominated Academy president Lynette Howell Taylor’s 51 Entertainment. Griffin will also executive produce the feature. FilmNation Entertainment is set to launch international sales at the upcoming Cannes market, while Fifth Season and CAA Media Finance Group will oversee domestic rights.

Aïnouz said: “I am thrilled to bring to the screen such a unique and moving portrait of a time where hope and celebration allowed our queer community to overcome one of the worst crises of last century. When many were dying of AIDS, there was a sense of solidarity and fury that made us stronger. Last Dance is a universal and urgent tale where joy is taken up as resilience, where the dance floor becomes a pièce de résistance. It is an honor to collaborate with such exquisite talent in order to bring this movie to life in a time where, more than ever, we need fables of hope.”

FilmNation Entertainment CEO Glen Basner added: “Emily Ziff Griffin’s unfiltered remembrance of her father and her unconventional upbringing is powerful in both its’ crystal-clear specificity, and in its relatability to all children — in all types of families — who look back on seminal, life moments. Last Dance vividly recreates New York in the nineties; the outsized joy and sorrow of that period and also presents a universal and deeply moving father daughter story.”

Aïnouz is represented by CAA, Lark and Granderson Des Rochers. Brody is represented by CAA and Kopeikin Law P.C. Zegler is represented by WME, The Initiative Group and Freundlich Law. Platt is represented by CAA, Untitled Entertainment, Immersive Management and Jackoway Austen. Griffin is represented by WME and Greenberg Glusker.

Read the whole article on Deadline.