Nicholas Cage Reveals He’s Considering Film Retirement After ‘3 or 4 More Movies'

Nicholas Cage revealed in a recent interview with Uproxx that he’s considering retirement from film acting in the imminent future. The veteran actor, who has appeared in three major releases in 2023 alone, feels that “after 45 years of doing this…in over 100 movies—I feel I’ve pretty much said what I’ve had to say with cinema.”

Cage noted that while he would've preferred to end his cinematic tenure with his current release, A24’s dark horror-comedy Dream Scenario. However, he has "maybe three or four more" film contracts to fulfill before he can call it quits. He’s considering a move into episodic television, as it allows him “to keep mixing it up. I don’t want to get stuck in any genre or any performance style.”

“I’d like to leave on a high note and say, ‘Adios,'” Cage said. “I think I have to do maybe three or four more movies before I can get there, and then hopefully switch formats and go into some other way of expressing my acting.”

Cage continued: “I would’ve liked to have left on a high note, like Dream Scenario. But I have other contracts that I have to fulfill, so we’ll see what happens. I mean, I am going to be very severe and very astringent on the selection process moving forward,” he said in reference to his mid-aughts wilderness period, which saw him starring in a litany of straight-to-video thrillers.

“I am very interested in immersion streaming with episodic television,” the Moonstruck star explained. “I have seen things that can be done now with characters and the time they’re given to express themselves. I saw Bryan Cranston stare at a suitcase for an hour on one episode of Breaking Bad. We don’t have time to do that in a feature film.”

Cage admitted that part of his consideration has to do with his family life. He and his wife, Riko Shibata, welcomed a daughter in September 2022, and the actor feels his relatively limited time has become more valuable.

“I’m going to be 60 next month and my dad died at 75. If I’m lucky, I have more years than he did, but I don’t know,” the star reflected. “What am I going to do with my next 15 years? Well, what’s important? What’s important is my children and I have a baby daughter. And if I can find an episodic show to do that stays in one place where I don’t have to keep leaving, we can all be together. That, on a personal level, would be great. But also I’m a student and I don’t know if I have anything else to learn in cinema. I might have something to learn in television.”

He concluded: “I feel like I’ve really been eclectic and I’ve explored the margins of film performance. And I’ve done every genre. And so the only thing I haven’t really done is Broadway, and I haven’t done a television show. I did one pilot that didn’t get picked up when I was 15, but I think I want to try something else.”

Cage is earning some deserved Oscar buzz for his performance in Dream Scenario. This year, he also appeared in the action-comedies Renfield, playing Dracula, and The Retirement Plan, as an aging assassin. He’s next set to appear in Lords of War, a sequel to his 2005 arms-industry satire Lord of War.