Luca Guadagnino makes deal with A24 for Daniel Craig-starring festival title, Queer

Ever since 2017’s Call Me By Your Name, Luca Guadagnino has been one of the premiere directors to watch. With a bold remake of Dario Argento’s Suspiria, a cannibal love story in Bones and All and sex-serving tennis drama Challengers, the guy hasn’t left the eye of film lovers. Now, the next feature from Guadagnino, Queer, has been acquired by A24 ahead of its Venice Film Festival premiere.

This news comes just as the Venice Film Festival launches, with Queer joining Challengers, Bones and All, Suspiria, A Bigger Splash, I Am Love, and Guadagnino’s debut, 1999’s The Protagonist, as films the Italian director has brought to the famed fest. However, unlike any of those other works, Queer marks the first time that Guadagnino will work with A24.

As for the plot of Queer: “Set in 1950s Mexico City, Queer follows William Lee, an American ex-pat in his late forties, as he leads a solitary life amidst a small American community. However, the arrival in town of Eugene Allerton, a young student, stirs William into finally establishing a meaningful connection with someone.” That Queer is also based on a William S. Burroughs novel adds a bit more excitement to the Guadagnino project, which has been in development since 2022.

Luca Guadagnino has assembled a strong cast for Queer, too, with Daniel Craig starring as William and Drew Starkey as Eugene, with Jason Schwartzman and Leslie Manville in other key roles.

In a joint statement (via Variety), Guadagnino and Craig said, “Queer is a labor of love, and we could not be more excited that our film has found a home with a studio as daring, vital, and trail-blazing as A24. It is our deep honor to finally bring Burroughs’ legendary novel to life on screen for the first time, and we feel immense gratitude and excitement to be able to present it alongside our treasured collaborators. We could not ask for better partners on this journey.”

Other than Luca Guadagnino’s Queer, this year’s Venice Film Festival also features Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door, Todd Phillips’ Joker: Folie à Deux, Walter Salles’ I’m Still Here, and more than a dozen other films in competition for the Golden Lion.

Are you a fan of Luca Guadagnino? Will you be checking out Queer when it hits theaters?