Martin Scorsese postpones filming of his Frank Sinatra and Jesus films

Both of the filmmaker’s projects have been postponed to a later date.

After the success of his latest feature film last year, Killers of the Flower Moon – which allowed its lead actress, Lily Gladstone, to become the first representative of the Native American peoples to receive a Golden Globe and to be nominated for the Oscar for best actress – Martin Scorsese was set to return behind the camera with two titanic projects. The first about the life of Jesus, and the second about the success and tumult of Frank Sinatra. The two films were to be shot back-to-back this year, but according to Variety, They were postponed. Did the filmmaker have delusions of grandeur?

Like a kind of Last Temptation of Christ 2.0, The Life of Jesushad been announced earlier in the year. It was an adaptation of the book by the Japanese Shūsaku Endō (published in 1973) and, although the casting had not yet been made official, the first rumors attested to the return of an actor who had already worked under Scorsese’s direction, Andrew Garfield, star of Silence (2016) – adaptation of a novel by the same author. Miles Teller (Whiplash, Top Gun: Maverick) was also mentioned in the list.

The Life of Jesus was to be financed without the help of studios, and filming was planned in Italy, Egypt and Israel – which could have posed a problem given the conflict in the region.

In another register, the director of Raging Bull was to feature the life of the singer of “Fly to the Moon” and “That’s Life” – a biopic that he had been imagining for several years, and for which he had called upon his favorite actor, Leonardo DiCaprio. For their seventh collaboration, he would have played Frank Sinatra, while Jennifer Lawrence would have been Ava Gardner, his second wife. At the time of its announcement, it was already clear that Martin Scorsese did not yet own the rights to the artist’s catalog, which is owned by his daughter Tina Sinatra. She had not yet signed on for the project.

As a possible consequence, the filming planned for November was ultimately postponed. According to Variety, The production teams reportedly received a message last August informing them of the news.

No reason has been given for the delay, although it could be due to the various issues listed above. However, don’t panic for moviegoers, the two projects are not completely abandoned and Scorsese has other films up his sleeve, including an adaptation of a novel by the author of Killers of the Flower Moonalso with Leonardo DiCaprio

Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio are set to reunite for The Wager