Alicia Vikander starring in HBO mini-series based on 1996 French movie Irma Vep… with original director Olivier Assayas returning
Alicia Vikander is starring in an upcoming HBO mini-series based on the acclaimed 1996 French movie Irma Vep.
Olivier Assayas who wrote and directed the original movie is returning to the same jobs for the television version, Deadline reports.
The show will star Alicia, 32, in a role loosely based on the one played by Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung in the film.
Incoming: Alicia Vikander is starring in an upcoming HBO mini-series based on the acclaimed 1996 French movie Irma Vep
While Maggie was portraying a fictionalized version of herself, Alicia’s character has had her name changed to Mira for the mini-series.
In both versions the lead character is an actress who has relocated to France from another country to star in a remake of the 1915 silent movie Les Vampires.
The seven-hour silent movie starred French actress Musidora as a character called Irma Vep, whose name is an anagram for Vampire.
In Olivier’s movie, Les Vampires is being remade by a has-been French director who casts Maggie as Irma and becomes infatuated with her.
Source material: The show will star Alicia, 32, in a role loosely based on the one played by Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung in the film
Silver fox: Olivier Assayas who wrote and directed the original movie is returning to the same jobs for the television version, Deadline reports
Not only does she become an object of lust for the director played by Jean-Pierre Leaud but also the costume designer played by Nathalie Richard.
In real life Maggie and Olivier got married in 1998 two years after the film came out, but by 2001 they had gotten divorced.
While the film’s version of Maggie is from China, Alicia’s version of Mira will be from America and will have come to France amid problems in her work and love life.
Irma is a thief – and while playing her, the leading lady of both the film and mini-series gets acquainted with the dangers of excessive Method acting.
Remake within a remake: In both versions the lead character is an actress who has relocated to France from another country to star in a remake of the 1915 silent movie Les Vampires
Alicia, who has been married to X-Men heartthrob Michael Fassbender since 2017, is also executive producing the new version.
Apparently she is in the habit of remaking movies into mini-series as she is doing the same for the Alfred Hitchcock classic Dial M For Murder.
Last month it emerged via The Hollywood Reporter that she is percolating a new version of the movie with The Wolf Of Wall Street screenwriter Terence Winter.
English writer Frederick Knott wrote both the original 1952 play and also the script of the Hitchcock adaptation, which starred Grace Kelly.
Throwback: The seven-hour silent movie starred French actress Musidora as a character called Irma Vep, whose name is an anagram for Vampire