Venice 2026: Actors Take Over the Director's Chair
Robert Pattinson isn't directing anything at this year's Venice Film Festival. He's just starring in somebody else's directorial debut. In a lineup this packed with actors calling "action" for the first time, that almost counts as the normal choice.
The 83rd Venice International Film Festival runs September 2–12 on the Lido, and buried under the marquee names is a trend worth paying attention to: movie stars are increasingly the ones behind the camera, not just in front of it. Casey Affleck makes his directorial debut with Company, starring Nick Nolte and Ben Mendelsohn. Lance Oppenheim, the documentarian behind Ren Faire, makes his narrative feature debut with Primetime, and cast Pattinson as his lead instead of reaching for an arthouse unknown. Florian Zeller (The Father) pairs Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz in Bunker. Martin McDonagh's Wild Horse Nine puts John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell in the same frame.
None of this is new: actors have been stepping behind the camera since Chaplin was doing both jobs at once. But the concentration this year says something about where prestige currency actually sits in 2026: not in the festival's traditional director-pipeline, but in stars using their own clout to greenlight riskier, smaller films the studios won't let them headline.
Then there's the ceremonial stuff, which is doing a lot of work for the festival's press coverage. George Clooney and Ellen Burstyn both receive the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, Venice's highest honor, awarded for a body of work rather than a single film. Danny Boyle opens the festival with Ink, a drama about Rupert Murdoch's 1969 takeover of The Sun, adapted from James Graham's Tony-nominated play. And Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger, a documentary on the band's reunion, premieres in the festival's new Open Non-Fiction section with both Gallagher brothers expected on the red carpet, reunion tour publicity dressed up as a festival premiere, basically, and it'll work.
If you want the actual cinema underneath the star power, look past the marquee names. Lee Chang-dong's Possible Love is his first film in eight years, the closest thing this lineup has to a genuine event for anyone who's been waiting since Burning and Poetry. Hirokazu Kore-eda's Look Back also lands in competition, alongside new work from Werner Herzog and Nanni Moretti.
Here's the number worth sitting with, though: of the 20 films in competition, exactly one is directed by a woman: May el-Toukhy. Festival director Alberto Barbera pledged 50/50 gender parity back in 2016, with a target date of 2020. It's 2026.
That gap, between the festival Venice wants photographed and the one it actually programs, is worth remembering once the red carpet coverage starts flooding in next week.