Angelina Jolie has transformed into the role of a lifetime, portraying legendary opera singer Maria Callas for Pablo Larraín‘s latest biopic, “Maria.”
After Larraín helmed “Spencer” and “Jackie,” the auteur is now taking on the Greek opera star whose own life mirrored the dramatic tragedies she also brought to the stage. The film is set during the last days of the chanteuse’s life in 1977. She died of a heart attack at age 53.
“Maria” concludes Larraín’s biopic trilogy. To note, Callas and Jackie Kennedy both shared a lover in Aristotle Onassis, portrayed by Haluk Bilginer in “Maria.” Onassis famously left Callas to marry Kennedy.
Callas was a world-famous soprano singer and infamously had a feud with Renata Tebaldi. The Greek-American singer suffered from near-sightedness throughout her life and was referred to as La Divina or “The Divine One.”
Per the official synopsis, the film explores the life of the legendary, iconic and controversial singer, often described as the original diva. Based on true accounts, “Maria” tells the tumultuous, beautiful, and tragic story of the life of the world’s greatest opera singer, relived and re-imagined during her final days in 1970s Paris. “Maria” debuted at Venice 2024 after being announced in 2022. The film is being billed as a “creative imagining and a psychological portrait” of the singer.
“Maria” is the “story about a woman that lived from the ’20s to ’70s, a woman who burned her voice, her life, by doing (what she loved) her work. The film is about someone who, after dedicating her life to audiences around the world that would listen to her, decides to finally find her own voice, her own identity, and finally do something for herself.”
Kodi Smit-McPhee, Pierfrancesco Favino, Alba Rohrwacher, Haluk Bilginer, and Valeria Golino co-star.
“Maria” was penned by “Spencer” screenwriter and “Peaky Blinders” scribe Steven Knight, who is also bringing “Peaky Blinders” to the big screen. Ed Lachman is the cinematographer, with Massimo Cantini Parrini handling costume design and production design by Guy Hendrix Dyas.
Director Larraín told Vanity Fair that Jolie spent six months training to portray Callas. The director wanted to capture Callas’ life story in an authentic way through Jolie.
“She became the sum of the tragedies that she played on stage,” Larraín said of Callas. “The movie is about someone who, after dedicating her life to the audiences around the world that would listen to her, decides to find her own voice, her own identity, and finally do something just for herself.”
As for Jolie, Larraín knew that no one else could be Callas.
“This is the greatest diva of the 20th century, and who could play that?” Larraín said. “I didn’t want to work with someone that didn’t have that already. I needed an actress who would naturally and organically be that diva, carry that weight, be that presence. Angelina was there.”
Larraín admitted that singing was actually “very scary” for Jolie, but the “dance of vulnerability” made for cinematic awe.
Read the IndieWire review here.
“Maria” is produced by Juan de Dios Larraín for Fabula, Jonas Dornbach for Komplizen Film and Lorenzo Mieli for The Apartment, a Fremantle Company. To note, Jolie has a three-year deal with the production company.
The feature was picked up by Netflix before its Venice debut. This is Netflix’s second film with Larraín after his 2023 feature “El Conde,” which received an Academy Award nomination for Best Cinematography.
“I’m excited to partner again with the Netflix team who care so passionately about movies,” Larraín said in a press statement. “This film is my most personal work yet. It is a creative imagining and psychological portrait of Maria Callas who, after dedicating her life to performing for audiences around the world, decides finally to find her own voice, her own identity, and sing for herself. I’m deeply honored to tell this story and share it with audiences worldwide like Maria did with her life.”
“Maria” premieres in select U.S. theaters on November 27 before debuting December 11 on Netflix. Check out the teaser below.
