After launching two Oscar Best Picture nominees in The Irishman and Marriage Story, Netflix is re-stocking its star-driven prestige film arsenal with a big one. Netflix has acquired all rights to the untitled Leonard Bernstein film that Bradley Cooper will direct, star in and produce from the script he co-wrote with Oscar-winning Spotlight scribe Josh Singer. The project exits Paramount, which set the film as a priority project in May 2018. Amblin remains firmly part of the drama that spans over 30 years in telling the beautifully complex story of the marriage between Bernstein and his wife, Felicia Montealegre. Netflix will make the film with a enviable roster of top producers: Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Cooper and his Joint Effort producing partner (and Joker director) Todd Phillips, Kristie Macosko Krieger, The Irishman and Joker double Oscar-nominated producer Emma Tillinger Koskoff, and Fred Berner and Amy Durning. The latter duo shepherded this project in various iterations over a decade.
Scorsese several years ago intended to direct a Bernstein film at Paramount when Singer was the sole scribe, but stepped aside to make way for Cooper as he put his time into directing Best Picture nominee The Irishman. Spielberg just shot a remake of West Side Story, using Bernstein’s music from the original film that was the late composer’s most famous movie credit. The deal allows Netflix a chance to be in business with Spielberg.
The Bernstein film is expected to begin production early next year. Netflix will give it a significant theatrical release before the film premieres on its streaming site, just as it did for Scorsese on The Irishman, as well as Marriage Story, The Two Popes and several other awards season contenders.
This will be the fourth project Cooper produces with Phillips at Joint Effort, including the 11-Oscar-nominated billion-dollar grosser Joker and the eight-Oscar-nominated A Star Is Born. Cooper next stars in the Guillermo del Toro-directed Nightmare Alley. He is repped by CAA.
