Although Kristen Stewart is better known for her roles as Bella Swan in the Twilight franchise and Princess Diana in Pablo Larraín’s Spencer, it is French cinema that holds a special place in her heart. She previously starred for Olivier Assayas in Sils Maria (2014) and Personal Shopper (2016), earning Stewart a best supporting actress César Award (the French equivalent of an Oscar) for the former in 2015. “In French films, there’s a kind of sensitivity that you don’t necessarily find elsewhere,” Stewart said at the Deauville American Film Festival, where her directorial debut, The Chronology of Water, won the Revelation prize. “And that touches me. It’s like looking in the mirror.”
Stewart is venturing back into French film for Full Phil, a mysterious new film from prolific filmmaker Quentin Dupieux, who confirmed that production had commenced via Instagram on September 29. Shortly after making his most recent project, The Piano Accident (2025), starring Adèle Exarchopoulos—part of Dupieux’s loyal troupe of actors like Raphaël Quenard—the director has outsourced to find his next leads. Well-known American actors Stewart and Woody Harrelson will headline Full Phil, which (according to Variety) sounds a bit like The White Lotus. Harrelson stars as Philip Doom, a wealthy American industrialist who attempts to reconcile with his daughter Madeleine (Stewart) during a dream trip to Paris. “Unfortunately, French cuisine, a 1950s horror film and an intrusive hotel employee disrupt the smooth running of their stay,” reads the synopsis.
Fittingly enough, Stewart and Harrelson are joined in the cast by Quebec actress Charlotte Le Bon, who played Greg’s (Jon Gries) girlfriend Chloe on the most recent season of The White Lotus. Also on the call sheet is Franco-British Emma Mackey (Sex Education) and French actor Nassim Lyes (Sous la Seine), as well as American comedians Eric Wareheim and Tim Heidecker. Variety reports that filming will take place entirely in Paris.
During filming, cast will certainly discover the French absurdism and the gritty, readily satirical tone of a director who is afraid neither of extremes nor of self-criticism, as Dupieux has proved in his films centered on the arts industry (Le Deuxième acte was about cinema and Yannick about theater).
Hugo Sélignac of production company Chi-Fou-Mi (which has collaborated with Dupieux since Mandibules released in 2021), is delighted to see that the director’s filmography is generating a real buzz among industry professionals on the other side of the Atlantic: “It’s crazy, Quentin’s films are extremely popular with the coolest American actors. When we send them [his films], they’re impressed, because when you look at American comedy today, it’s kind of stalled,” Sélignac told Variety. “The Second Act (a 2024 #MeToo era romantic comedy starring Lea Seydoux that premiered on the opening night of Cannes Film Festival), in particular, generated a lot of enthusiasm. Suddenly, American actors were like, ‘Wait, we can still make movies like this? Can we still laugh at everything? Can we still make jokes like this about women, men, minorities?’”
Full Phil does not currently have a release date.
Originally published in Vanity Fair France
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