Adele, Nicholas Hoult, Owen Cooper, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson to Star in Tom Ford’s Cry To Heaven
According to CinemaDrame News Agency, it has been nearly a decade since Tom Ford last directed a film, but the filmmaker and fashion designer is finally preparing to return with a new project featuring a stellar cast.
Deadline reports that Ford will direct an adaptation of Cry to Heaven, a novel by Anne Rice, the author of Interview with the Vampire. In addition to directing and writing the film, Ford will also produce it through his company Fade to Black.
Nicholas Hoult, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Adele in her first film role, Ciarán Hinds, George MacKay, Mark Strong, Colin Firth, Paul Bettany, Owen Cooper, Daniel Quinn-Toye, Hunter Schafer, Josephine Thysen, Thandiwe Newton, Théodore Pellerin, Daryl McCormack, Cassian Bilton, Huck Hanemann, and Lux Pascal will all appear in the film.
The project is in pre-production and will begin filming in Rome and London in mid-January 2026. Cry to Heaven is expected to hit theaters next fall.
Anne Rice’s novel follows a young Venetian nobleman and a Calabrian singer, both striving to succeed in the world of opera in 18th-century Italy. The story explores themes of identity, betrayal, love, and both artistic and personal freedom.
Ford has been developing the project since last year, and after negotiations with Hollywood studios, he chose to finance the film independently to maintain full creative control over the final cut. Ford, previously the creative director of Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, sold his own brand “Tom Ford” two years ago for $2.8 billion.
The film marks Ford’s reunion with Aaron Taylor-Johnson after Nocturnal Animals and with Colin Firth after A Single Man. A Single Man, which screened in competition at the Venice Film Festival in 2009, earned an Oscar nomination, won a BAFTA, and was named Best Film of the Year by the American Film Institute (AFI). Ford’s Nocturnal Animals won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2016 Venice Film Festival, earned nine BAFTA nominations, three Golden Globe nominations—including Best Director and Best Screenplay—and received an Oscar nomination for Michael Shannon for Best Supporting Actor.
