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Saltburn: Emerald Fennell On What Drew Her To Her Two Leading Men

Saltburn director and writer Emerald Fennell details casting her two leading men, plus we have two new posters.

Published Tue, 24 Oct 2023 16:17:07 -0500

When you have a film like Saltburn that will be heavily leaning on your cast's performances and specifically your leads, you need to make sure you find the people who will fit the specific roles you're looking to fill. Bad casting is one of those things that can hurt a film and drag something that, even if every other aspect was great, back down to just good or even mediocre just from one casting decision. So when it came to her two leading men in Saltburn, Emerald Fennell explained to Empire what specific qualities from each drew her to Barry Keoghan and Jacob Elordi. For Keoghan, she saw him in the fantastically underrated The Killing of the Sacred Deer and knew that it was only a matter of time before she found a way to work with him.

"Saltburn starts with an outsider — in this case Oliver Quick," she writes. "I had seen Barry Keoghan in The Killing Of A Sacred Deer and had wanted to work with him ever since. We never leave Oliver's side, and so we needed someone as singular and compelling as Barry; someone who could bring both the vulnerability and the dark sex appeal Oliver requires."

: Courtesy of MGM and Amazon Studios

: Courtesy of MGM and Amazon Studios

Oliver isn't the only leading man in Saltburn. Elordi is on the way to having an absolutely bonker fall season between Priscilla and now this film as well. Fennell explained that Felix is a character that could have been extremely one-note, but Elordi came in and brought something much more human to the role that she could only describe as "devastatingly real."

"Felix, the Golden Boy, could easily have been a cipher," she writes. "But Jacob Elordi came in to audition and made him so devastatingly real. The thing I'd been looking for was someone who looked like a god but was actually just a fairly straightforward, disappointing mortal — a lot of people were tempted to lean into a more arch, Sebastian Flyte style of audition, but Jacob's Felix felt like the sort of boy you'd do anything to snog in Freshers' Week."

MGM and Amazon Studios have released two more posters spotlighting both Keoghan and Elordi. The posters for this film have been nothing short of gorgeous, and these two mirror and complement each other beautifully. Saltburn has the very hard task of competing against films like The Marvels, Wish, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, Thanksgiving, Trolls Band Together, and more. November is a VERY busy time of the month, and this November is brutal; there will be casualties, and films like Saltburn tend to be the first to fall to massive family-friendly blockbusters.

Saltburn: Summary, Cast List, Release Date

Academy Award-winning filmmaker Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman) brings us a beautifully wicked tale of privilege and desire. Struggling to find his place at Oxford University, student Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan) finds himself drawn into the world of the charming and aristocratic Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi), who invites him to Saltburn, his eccentric family's sprawling estate for a summer never to be forgotten.

Saltburn is written and directed by Emerald Fennell and stars Barry Keoghan, Jacob Elordi, Rosamund Pike, Richard E. Grant, Alison Oliver, Archie Madekwe, and Carey Mulligan. It will be produced by Emerald Fennell, p.g.a; Margot Robbie, p.g.a; Josey McNamara, p.g.a, and will be released limited on November 17th, and on November 22nd, it will released wide.

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