International correspondent Manori Ravindran, Dealmakers columnist Ashley Cullins and awards editor Katey Rich are on the ground in Cannes. Ashley and Manori got early dish on the festival market, Ashley spoke with top indie dealmakers and Manori interviewed StudioCanal’s Anne Chérel about the company’s ambitious global strategy.
Today: my report on YouTuber Markiplier and the wave of talent who hit the fest this afternoon. Along with yesterday’s event centered on AI, it’s another sign of Cannes embracing big changes in cinema — and bringing a new kind of energy to the Croisette.
But there was a more familiar — and equally charged — kind of energy shift this morning when Adam Driver walked into the Grand Palais press conference for James Gray’s Paper Tiger: A bona fide Hollywood movie star had touched down in Cannes. The energy crackled when he was asked about Lena Dunham’s portrayal of him in her memoir, Famesick, writing that he was “half-man half-beast” in the early days of their HBO hit Girls and at one point threw a chair at a wall next to her.
“I have no comment on any of that,” said Driver gamely, and quipped, “I’m saving it all for my book” to laughter from journalists. The star went on to answer everything asked of him in the room (even this gem: “How do you keep your soul in shape?”). But you have to wonder how often Dunham’s words will come up during Paper Tiger’s awards run. And there will surely be one of those.
Katey Rich tells me Oscar buzz was already starting right there in the room at the Paper Tiger afterparty, which didn’t even kick off until midnight and offered a glimpse into another revered Cannes tradition: reading the reviews the moment they’re published. The good news is that it was mostly raves for Neon’s old-fashioned crime saga, which includes one of Driver’s career-best performances and one of Gray’s signature jaw-dropping final shots. Katey also spoke with Driver one-on-one this afternoon, and will have her interview with him in tomorrow’s Prestige Junkie.
Earlier on Saturday, Netflix held an exclusive drinks event on the Palais beachfront. The streamer has famously been excluded from competing at Cannes since 2017, when it arrived with Bong Joon-ho’s Okja and Noah Baumbach’s The Meyerowitz Stories, causing such a stink from France’s cinema community that the festival changed its competition rules to only allow movies that will get a full theatrical release in France.
It’s always been a sore spot, but now that Netflix is giving Greta Gerwig’s Chronicles of Narnia adaptation a wide 45-day theatrical release in 2027, there’s a feeling that the streamer may participate in Cannes in the very near future. And if that’s the case, it probably can’t hurt to grease the wheels with a beach soirée, right?
Markiplier Makes the Scene
Speaking of changes at Cannes, the market’s first-ever Creator Economy Summit today saw Iron Lung director and YouTube creator Mark Fischbach (aka Markiplier) literally get mobbed — the same kind of reception he enjoyed after his Ankler panel at NAB Show last month. Young festival delegates lined up to shake his hand and share how he’s inspired them to make their own movies.
Fischbach self-financed his sci-fi horror Iron Lung and put it into 4,000 cinemas, where it grossed $50 million globally on a $3 million budget. Now it will be released exclusively on YouTube’s Movies platform on May 31, he announced.
When I caught up with Fischbach, he’d been in Cannes for around five hours and was running on an hour’s sleep. Would he ever want to have a movie playing here? “I would be happy to submit, and if it doesn’t get accepted, I would cry,” he tells me.
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