The Oscar-nominated actor Saoirse Ronan is reportedly set to play Linda McCartney in Sam Mendes’s The Beatles – A Four-Film Cinematic Event.
According to Deadline, multiple sources have claimed that the star of Little Women and Lady Bird will play the first wife of Paul McCartney in the upcoming set of biopics. The singer will be played by Paul Mescal, who starred alongside Ronan in the sci-fi drama Foe.
Sony has yet to make an official confirmation.
Each of the four films will tell the story of a different Beatle with Barry Keoghan as Ringo Starr, Joseph Quinn as George Harrison and Harris Dickinson as John Lennon. Dickinson, who recently received acclaim for his directorial debut, Urchin, has said the prospect is “frightening” in an interview with the Times.
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In July, Starr said he asked for changes in the script after meeting with Mendes but is now “much more satisfied with how he’s depicted in the script”. The scripts are being written by Jez Butterworth, Peter Straughan and Jack Thorne.
“The Beatles changed my understanding of music,” Mendes said in April. “I’ve been trying to make a movie about them for years.” He added: “There had to be a way to tell the epic story for a new generation. I can assure you there is still plenty left to explore and I think we found a way to do that.”
Ronan has received four Oscar nominations and was last seen in The Outrun and Steve McQueen’s Blitz. She recently led the dark comedy Bad Apples, which premiered at the Toronto film festival, and will also be starring with Austin Butler in Deep Cuts, a music drama based on Holly Brickley’s debut novel.
Linda and Paul McCartney met in 1967 when she was a photographer and they were married up until her death in 1998. She was part of his later band Wings and was an animal rights activist who wrote vegetarian cookbooks and founded a successful food company. – Guardian
