Sebastián Lelio, the Oscar-winning auteur behind “A Fantastic Woman,” will direct Andrew Garfield and Daisy Edgar-Jones in “Voyagers,” the story of the romantic relationship between astronomer and “Contact” author Carl Sagan and documentary producer and director Ann Druyan.
The feature is produced by Ben Browning for FilmNation Entertainment, Lynda Obst, who guided “Contact” to the big screen, and Druyan herself. FilmNation Entertainment is set to launch global sales at the upcoming Cannes Market
“Voyagers” unfolds in 1977 as NASA prepared to launch humanity’s first interstellar probes. A team led by Sagan sets out to create a message to accompany them, known as the Golden Record, which included music and images, for possible alien civilizations. But what starts out as a race-against-the-clock mission blossoms into a love story between Sagan and Druyan. FilmNation Entertianment paired Druyan, who married Sagan in 1981, with screenwriters Lelio and Jessica Goldberg. They then wrote the original screenplay based on interviews with Druyan and many others who worked on the Golden Record project.
Druyan and Sagan would go on to write “Cosmos,” an influential PBS series covering a vast range of scientific topics. Sagan died in 1996.
“As a nine-year-old boy growing up during Chile’s dictatorship, Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan’s TV series ‘Cosmos’ had a profound impact on me, igniting my fascination with life’s biggest questions and mysteries,” Lelio said. “It is a dream to make a movie about the Golden Record and, within it, the inspiring love story between Carl and Ann. I’m thrilled that Andrew Garfield and Daisy Edgar-Jones will be at the center of this epic romance set against the infinite backdrop of space and time.”
Lelio most recently co-wrote and directed “The Wonder,” starring Florence Pugh. His other credits include “Gloria Bell” with Julianne Moore, which was an English-language remake of Lelio’s “Gloria.”
Garfield, an Oscar nominee for “Hacksaw Ridge” and “Tick Tick…Boom!,” is currently in production on John Crowley’s “We Live in Time,” in which he stars alongside Pugh. He most recently starred opposite Edgar-Jones in FX’s “Under the Banner of Heaven”, which earned him his first Emmy Award nomination and Edgar-Jones her second Golden Globe award nomination. She is best known for her sperformance in the Emmy Award nominated series “Normal People” based on Sally Rooney’s best-selling novel, as well as last summer’s hit film, “Where the Crawdads Sing.”
“Imagine falling madly, truly in love with one of the greatest humans who ever lived, while creating a complex message about what it is to be alive, a golden record affixed to the first interstellar spacecraft launched by our species, bound to sail the Milky Way galaxy long after Earth ceases to exist,” Druyan said. “It takes a movie to bring that mythic experience, that cosmic love story to vivid life. After years of searching, I feel that we have found exactly the right colleagues and artists to capture the magic of it.”
Lelio is represented by LARK, Entertainment 360, and Granderson Des Rochers; Garfield is represented by CAA, Gordon & French, ID and Sloane, Offer, Weber & Dern; Edgar-Jones is repped by UTA, Hamilton Hodell, Relevant, Public Eye Communications and Sloane, Offer, Weber & Dern.; Goldberg is represented by United Talent Agency and attorney Jeff Franke; Obst is represented by Eric Suddleson at Felker Toczek Suddleson Abramson McGinnis Ryan LLP.
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