An Elon Musk Biopic is Coming, Someday. In the Meantime, Let's Cast it Ourselves

Photo by Toby Melville - Pool/Getty Images

Whether we like it or not, Elon Musk has made himself one of the most ubiquitous public figures of the 21st century. From Tesla and SpaceX to his relationship with Grimes to his highly-publicized purchase of Twitter and his embrace of troubling far-right wing talking points, the 52-year-old South African billionaire is both a mogul and a celebrity. To borrow a quote from Sarah Silverman in the movie Popstar, Musk is “everywhere…like oxygen, or gravity, or clinical depression.”

With that in mind, it’s almost surprising that a prestige Musk biopic hasn’t come around til now, when Variety reported on November 10 that Darren Aronofsky would be making a film about him for A24. Casting for biographical films is always the subject of much debate, and with Musk still very much present in our daily lives, the speculation has already taken off, unlike certain SpaceX rockets. Musk himself has already given the project his seal of approval, writing “Glad Darren is doing it. He is one of the best" on the social-media platform no one but him refers to as “X.”

Though Musk is an idiosyncratic figure, there is some precedent for how the film might look. First, it’ll be based on Walter Isaacson’s 2023 authorized biography Elon Musk. Isaacson, a prolific biographer, wrote books about Albert Einstein, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Steve Jobs, the latter of which served as the basis for Danny Boyle’s excellent 2015 film about the Apple founder, which was noteworthy for its clever structure–the whole film hinged around three pivotal press conferences and how they connected both to the company’s trajectory as well as Jobs’ personal life.

Not knowing exactly how Aronosky wants to frame his film makes imaging the movie, which we have to imagine will be called Musk, difficult, but GQ has taken a crack at providing some casting ideas for key characters in the controversial businessman’s life. For what it’s worth, we’re hoping the movie ends in a Warrior-style MMA fight between Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, even if that won’t be happening in real life.

Elon Musk

Fresh off a key supporting role in Killers of the Flower Moon, Jesse Plemons seems like a stellar option. He shined as a sinister tech guy in one of the best episodes of Black Mirror and a captivatingly smarmy CEO in the underrated Windfall. With one of the most varied filmographies of any recent character actor, Plemons is clearly capable of capturing the ambition and egotism of Musk, while also injecting the film with a handful of humorous moments, too. Credit to Reddit for this one, but Mads Mikkelsen would be excellent if Aronofsky wanted to focus primarily on present day-Musk. Brendan Fraser, who won an Academy Award this year for his work in Aronofsky’s polarizing The Whale, has also been floated, and this would certainly be the kind of meaty role that’d fit his career renaissance.

One slight dark horse who has received some love on social media is Joseph Gordon-Levitt, the 42-year-old actor who was a cinema staple in the 2010s, but has seen his spotlight diminish in recent years. JGL has plenty of experience in biopics, notably playing Edward Snowden and French daredevil Philippe Petit in one of the best performances of his career. He also played Travis Kalanick, the bristling ex-CEO of Uber in Super Pumped, embodying a kind of Silicon Valley unlikability so wholly that it made the series itself a difficult watch. Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane bears a clear resemblance to Musk and is an expert at impressions, though it’s hard to tell if that kind of stunt casting would appeal to Aronofsky. (For similar aesthetic reasons, there’s been a groundswell of support behind Kevin Durand.) If the movie opts to focus more heavily on the billionaire’s earlier life, Get Out’s Caleb Landry Jones would make a compelling Musk, as would someone like Alexander Skarsgård, whose terrific turn as Succession tech mogul Lukas Matsson makes him a natural fit for Musk.

Aronofsky’s films have attracted plenty of marquee stars in the past, and it’s possible that the opportunity to play Musk and potentially earn an easy Oscar nod would appeal to the likes of Matt Damon, Christian Bale, Nicolas Cage, or Jake Gyllenhaal.

Grimes:

Frankly, Grimes deserves her own biopic one day–the Priscilla to Elon’s Elvis–and depending on how Aronofsky chooses to tackle the timeline of Musk’s life, choosing her actor will be pivotal. Twitter users have floated Yellowjackets’ Sophie Thatcher, who bears a resemblance to the musician. She’s over a decade younger than Grimes, but it doesn’t seem like a dealbreaker suspension of disbelief. Hunter Schafer would fit into the same category of ascendant young acting talent. She’s been incredibly selective about film roles outside of Euphoria, with upcoming projects by David Lowery and Yorgos Lanthimos, so an Aronofsky film would seemingly fit that oeuvre. Suzanna Son, star of Red Rocket is an incendiary young talent who also has bona fide musical chops, which could potentially prove an asset in the role.

Of performers with longer CVs, Rooney Mara would excel, channeling some of the energy from her The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo character. Natalie Portman would be great, too, channeling her performance in Vox Lux (plus she won an Oscar working with Aronofsky on Black Swan).. Margaret Qualley seems like an actor who could really nail Grimes’ iconoclasm. Indie cinema darlings like Mia Goth, Kristen Stewart, and Evan Rachel Wood are all compelling options, too.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy:

The Ukrainian president figures heavily into Isaacson’s biography, which focuses extensively on the Starlink scandal, in which Musk refused to support Ukraine using satellites from SpaceX to assist in a counterattack on Russian ships after its 2022 invasion. Musk claimed that he didn’t want to be part of any further escalation of the conflict, but the decision was roundly criticized by Ukrainian officials, and led to a public war of words between Musk and politicians like Mykhailo Podolyak, Mykhailo Fedorov, and, most crucially, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Zelenskyy, the 45-year-old president whose leadership through the war made him a prominent figure on the global geopolitical scene, is likely to figure into any movie based around Isaacson’s book. The politician was an actor himself, though it’s hard to imagine he’d have the time or interest in a self-insert cameo. Assuming Aronofsky doesn’t cast a Ukrainian actor, there’s been talk of Jeremy Renner in the role, though that was tied to the idea of a Zelenskyy-centric biopic. Possible other fits: Ryan Phillippe or Nathan Fillion.

Justine Musk:

Musk’s first wife, the Canadian author Justine Musk, could be an important part of the film’s story. The pair were married from 2000 to 2008, and Justine has written about their relationship and divorce powerfully for Marie Claire. They met in college at Queen’s University, and the pair have five children together, while also having suffered the loss of their first-born to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome in 2002. Surely a smaller role in the overarching biopic, this role could be filled memorably by actors like Judy Greer or Yvonne Strahovski.

Jack Dorsey

A small, but memorable character in the film could be Twitter co-founder and ex-CEO Jack Dorsey. The relationship between Dorsey and Musk is explored in Isaacson’s book, including that Dorsey both suggested making Musk a member of the company’s board of directors, and that he got cold feet before striking a lucrative deal with the future Twitter owner. Dorsey has publicly criticized Elon since he took over, so their friends-to-enemies arc could make for a few strong scenes. Let’s say Chris Pine, Jack Whitehall, or Peter Dinklage in a surprise cameo.

Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning

The actual founders of Tesla, two California-born entrepreneurs, probably won’t figure heavily into Aronofsky’s flick. But if the director does choose to explore this relationship, which eventually turned acrimonious with lawsuits and public criticism lobbed back and forth, he could lean on something like John Lee Hancock’s The Founder about Ray Kroc and McDonald’s. Musk made his first major investment in 2004, when Eberhard and Tarpenning were in their mid-40s, so we suggest Bill Hader or Jorma Taccone and Michael Sheen or Martin Freeman as the latter.

Voice of the Cybertruck

Bonus high-concept pitch for this movie, if they want to go the full Steve Jobs route: Elon Musk (played by one of the above actors) is on his way to Weekend 2 of Coachella when his Cybertruck breaks down on a dark desert highway without a cell tower in sight. As he spends the night waiting in vain for a lift to the nearest gas station, Elon has time to re-experience key points of his personal history in a series of flashbacks. His only company during this period of forced self-examination is "Cy," the voice of the car's navigation system, which begins asking him probing questions about his life. We know he's retired, but we remain convinced the only living person who can play this part is Sir Michael Caine.

Originally Appeared on GQ