Maps to the Stars is a 2014 satirical black comedy film directed by David Cronenberg, and starring Julianne Moore, Mia Wasikowska, John Cusack, Robert Pattinson, Olivia Williams, Sarah Gadon, and Evan Bird. The screenplay was written by Bruce Wagner, who had written a novel entitled Dead Stars based on the Maps to the Stars script, after initial plans for making the film with Cronenberg fell through.
This is the second consecutive collaboration between Cronenberg and Pattinson (after Cosmopolis) and marks the third collaboration between Cronenberg and Prospero Pictures, who previously collaborated on A Dangerous Method and Cosmopolis. This is also the third Cronenberg film made with Canadian actress Sarah Gadon. It is the first Cronenberg film shot partially in the United States, although most of it was shot, like his other films, in his native city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
The film concerns the plight of a child star and a washed-up actress while commenting on the entertainment industry's relationship with Western civilization as a whole. The film premiered in competition for the Palme d'Or at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival on May 19, 2014. Moore won the festival's Best Actress Award. Following its premiere at Cannes, the film had a theatrical release in France on May 21, 2014.
Plot
Agatha Weiss arrives in Los Angeles from Florida and hires limousine driver Jerome to take her to the site of the former house of her brother Benjie. Agatha has severe burns to her face and body, requiring her to take a copious amount of medication, and is estranged from her parents, Stafford and Cristina Weiss. Benjie, a child star and recovering drug addict, visits a girl suffering from non-Hodgkin lymphoma in the hospital. The girl later dies, and Benjie is confronted by her ghost.
Stafford is a TV psychologist treating aging actress Havana Segrand for trauma from the psychological and sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of her deceased mother, legendary Hollywood star Clarice Taggart. Havana's agent Genie struggles to secure Havana a role in a remake of her mother's film Stolen Waters. Havana regularly suffers from vivid hallucinations of her mother, who taunts and verbally abuses her. At the suggestion of her friend Carrie Fisher, Havana hires Agatha, whom Carrie had met on Twitter, as a personal assistant. Agatha continues to see Jerome, and a romance forms. Stafford is distressed to learn from Havana that Agatha has returned to Los Angeles.
Genie informs Havana that another actress was cast in Stolen Waters, but when the actress's young son unexpectedly dies in an accident, Havana secures the part. Using Havana's role to gain access to the studio lot, Agatha visits Benjie on the set of Bad Babysitter 2, the comedy he is filming as his comeback following drug rehabilitation. Agatha tells him that she has returned from a sanatorium to make amends for setting the fire that burned her and nearly killed him when he was seven. Appalled to learn Agatha visited Benjie, Stafford finds her in her hotel room, gives her $10,000 and tells her to leave Los Angeles.
Benjie relapses, getting high on GHB and shooting his friend Rhett's dog. On set, he is haunted by the girl from the hospital and strangles his young co-star nearly to death during one of his hallucinations. The child survives, but Benjie loses his role in the film and is committed to a hospital. Agatha visits Cristina and reveals that before she set the fire she had discovered that her parents were brother and sister, making Agatha and Benjie children of incest. Cristina tells her they were separated as children and met by coincidence, starting a relationship before they knew of their relation. Stafford comes home, and when Agatha tells him she knows about their incest, he violently beats her until Cristina intervenes. During the altercation, Agatha steals Cristina's wedding ring.
Havana requests Jerome as a driver and seduces him in the backseat of his parked limo in the driveway of her home as Agatha watches from the window. Havana enters the house and berates Agatha for her poor performance at work. When Havana verbally humiliates Agatha for staining her couch with menstrual blood, Agatha beats Havana to death with one of her awards. Benjie escapes the hospital and comes to Havana's house to find Agatha. Agatha instructs Benjie to retrieve her father's ring.
Stafford returns home to see Cristina on fire outside beside the pool; he pushes her into the pool with a piece of furniture to save her, but she dies. Stafford goes into a catatonic state and does not resist when Benjie removes the ring from his finger. The siblings use their parents' rings in a wedding ritual they used to perform as children, then commit suicide using Agatha's medication.
Throughout the film, liberal quotations from Paul Éluard's poem "Liberté" meander "through each of the characters' lives," creating an underlying mantra for the film.
Cast
Main cast Julianne Moore as Havana Segrand A famous but aging and fading actress living in the shadow of her legendary movie-star mother and feeling abused by her. Moore based the character on "an amalgam of people I've known and observed. She is someone who lives completely isolated in this make-believe world. She doesn't really have a family and she's still very angry with her mother because she feels she was abused. She's always lived in her mother's shadow, and in her mind, it's all a kind of mixed-up, Freudian mess." Mia Wasikowska as Agatha Weiss The scarred and estranged pyromaniac daughter of the Weiss family who takes a job as Havana's personal assistant, while waiting for the opportunity to make amends with her family. Wasikowska said, "I love Agatha because she's dark inside but at the same time in a lot of ways she has this very positive outlook. There's something very sweet and sad about this girl who, in the midst of these celebrity-obsessed parents, and this troubled past, really just wants to connect with them. They've totally rejected her, but in a way, she's desperately trying to mimic their lives. She's desperately trying to find her identity." She further added, "She has the gloves she wears over her burns, the facial scar, and all these rituals with the poem and the pills she takes, it's all very distinct to who she is." John Cusack as Stafford Weiss The head of the Weiss family, a TV psychologist with a number of high-profile celebrity clients, and immensely egoistic about the success of his son Benjie. Stafford exploits people's emotions and takes advantage of them. Stafford Weiss and his wife Cristina are brother and sister; they were separated at birth and discovered their relation after meeting in college and becoming a couple. According to Cusack, "He sees himself as a healer. He's part Tony Robbins, part Reiki Master, part shrink. But his son is the real star—he's a massive teen star of Bieberesque proportions." Describing the script he said, "It was the most savage destruction of Hollywood fame and secrets and that whole toxic brew that I'd ever seen." Evan Bird as Benjie Weiss A child actor sensation and controversial star who is trying to get his career on track after his stint at rehab while simultaneously battling demons from his past. Cronenberg was not sure that any child actor could play Benjie's character successfully until he saw Bird in the TV series The Killing. Bird said about his character, "[H]e doesn't really have love and yet he doesn't really have limitations, either. So he's searching for both of those things. He's making way too much money, he's being taken advantage of by his parents, and he's really screwed up." Olivia Williams as Cristina Weiss Ambitious and controlling, she manages the career of her son. Cristina Weiss and her husband Stafford are sister and brother; they were separated at birth and discovered their relation after meeting in college and becoming a couple. According to Williams, "She is a very ambitious woman and we get to see her downfall from the very heights of her power. She operates in a world where someone could be the nastiest person on earth and make your life hell, but you might still want them in your movie because they'll make you money." Robert Pattinson as Jerome Fontana A limousine driver and struggling actor who wants to be a successful screenwriter. Jerome is inspired by Bruce Wagner, who, at the time when he conceived the idea for this story, was himself a struggling actor and writer working as a limo driver. Pattinson described the character as most sane and ordinary but like every LA dreamer in the story and said, "Jerome would never accept that he is just a limo driver. I think he feels he's just waiting for his break. And yet, he's seemingly the only one in this story who's not going insane—or who isn't a ghost." And about the script he added that "It's really about people who lie to themselves—right up until the end." Sarah Gadon as Clarice Taggart An iconic Hollywood movie star who died in a fire and appears as a twenty-something-year-old ghost to her daughter Havana. Cronenberg said that "it's such a lovely, unusual role, because she's simply this ghostly memory." Gadon said, "I really want to do the film because I thought it was a critique about contemporary Hollywood. And, specifically, of a woman's place in Hollywood."
Other cast
Kiara Glasco as Cammy A girl who died young and appears as a ghost to Benjie because he visited her in the hospital before her death with the intentions of making a film on her life, and used his visit as a publicity stunt. Dawn Greenhalgh as Genie Havana's agent who assists her in landing the role in the remake of Clarice's film. Jonathan Watton as Sterl Carruth A film actor and friend of Havana. Jennifer Gibson as Starla Gent A country singer and friend of Sterl. Gord Rand as Damien Javitz A rising talented director of the remake of Stolen Waters, and described as "He's no P. T. Anderson, but he resurrects actors." Justin Kelly as Rhett A young Hollywood actor and friend of Benjie. Niamh Wilson as Sam A girl who's in Benjie and Rhett's circle of friends. Clara Pasieka as Gretchen Voss A young Hollywood actress and friend of Rhett. Emilia McCarthy as Kayla A young Hollywood actress and friend of Benjie. Allegra Fulton as Harriet Benjie's therapist. Domenic Ricci as Micah Azita's young son who died in a tragic accident. Jayne Heitmeyer as Azita Wachtel An actress and Havana's rival for the coveted role in the remake of Clarice's 1960 movie Stolen Waters. Sean Robertson as Roy A four-year-old costar of Benjie, whom Benjie perceives as competition and injures him during his hallucination believing him to be Cammy. Ari Cohen as Jeb Berg A Hollywood producer working on the sequel of Benjie's blockbuster film, a fictitious teen comedy titled "Bad Babysitter". Carrie Fisher as herself Fisher has a cameo appearance in the film. Agatha Weiss befriended her on Twitter to write a novel and on her recommendation Havana hired Agatha as her new personal assistant.
Production
Development
Plans for the film hit financial difficulties and it was in development for around six years. During promotion of Cosmopolis in May 2012, at Cannes, David Cronenberg said that "It's not a 'go' picture. We have a script that I love that Bruce wrote; it's a very difficult film to get made as was Cosmopolis actually. Whether I can get this movie to happen, I tried it five years ago, I couldn't get it made, so I still might not be able to get it made." He also added that "Maps to the Stars is very extreme. It's not obviously a very big commercial movie, and even as an independent film it's difficult. Maps to the Stars is completely different [from Cosmopolis], but it's very acerbic and satirical; it's a hard sell."