Focus Features Buys International Rights to Brady Corbet’s ‘The Brutalist,’ Starring Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones (EXCLUSIVE)

Focus Features has bought international rights to Brady Corbet’s “The Brutalist,” starring Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones, Guy Pearce and Joe Alwyn, Variety has learned.

Corbet, who sits on the Berlinale jury, penned the film with Mona Fastvold (“The World to Come”), a Norwegian filmmaker who is also his wife. The film charts 30 years in the lives of visionary architect László Toth and his wife, Erzsébet, who flee post-war Europe in 1947 and witness the birth of modern America. László initially endures poverty and indignity, but the architect’s genius soon catches the attention of charming industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren, whose dark influence threatens to destroy everything László and his wife have built.

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The cast is completed by Raffey Cassidy (“White Noise”), Isaach De Bankolé (“Casino Royale”), Alessandro Nivola (“The Many Saints of Newark”), Stacy Martin (“Nymphomaniac Vol I”), Emma Laird (“Mayor of Kingstown”), Jonathan Hyde (“Titanic”) and Peter Polycarpou (“Evita”). Filming was delayed due to the pandemic and finally kicked in the spring of 2023 in Hungary.

“The Brutalist” crew includes Lol Crawley (“White Noise”), composer Daniel Blumberg (“The World to Come”), costume designer Kate Forbes (“Fair Play”), editor Dávid Jancsó (“The World to Come”) and production designer Judy Becker (“Brokeback Mountain”).

Trevor Matthews and Nick Gordon are producing for Brookstreet UK alongside Brian Young and Kaplan Morrison’s Andrew Morrison. Also producing are Andrew Lauren for Andrew Lauren Productions and D.J. Gugenheim. Co-producing is Joshua Horsfield’s Intake Films out of the UK while Viktoria Petrányi’s Proton Cinema is providing production services in Hungary. Brookstreet UK and Kaplan Morrison are financing with Lip Sync Productions, Richmond Pictures, Meyohas Studio, Carte Blanche, and senior lender Cofiloisirs. “The Brutalist” is represented by Protagonist in international markets with CAA Media Finance handling domestic sales.

“The Brutalist” follows Corbet’s features “The Childhood of a Leader,” which won best debut film at the Venice Film Festival, and “Vox Lux,” which starred Natalie Portman and Jude Law and debuted at Venice. An actor-turned-director, Corbet also previously directed the short film “Protect You + Me,” which played at Sundance.

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