Harris Dickinson plays John Lennon, Paul Mescal is Paul McCartney, Barry Keoghan is Ringo Starr, and Joseph Quinn is George Harrison.
Finally! The cast of the four upcoming Beatles biopics has officially been announced—and, fan or not, we are quite certain your interest will be piqued. The casting screams “HOT!” times four, with Harris Dickinson playing John Lennon, Paul Mescal as Paul McCartney, Barry Keoghan as Ringo Starr, and Joseph Quinn as George Harrison.
Mescal’s casting is far from being a surprise. Last year, director Ridley Scott accidentally confirmed the rumor that the 29-year-old Irish actor, his lead star in Gladiator II, would play McCartney. Still, the announcement of the complete quartet was met with much excitement.
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Oscar-winning director Sam Mendes, who will be directing all Beatles films, made the announcement at a surprise appearance at CinemaCon in Las Vegas on Monday, March 31. He also confirmed that there will be four biopics, each film focusing on one member of the band. One not-so-good news, however: we have to wait exactly three years from now, as all films will have a theatrical release in April 2028. What is unclear, though, is whether or not they will be released in one fell swoop, or if they will be dropped once a week over the course of a month.
Given the novelty of the idea, Mendes says that the multi-part biopic, officially titled The Beatles – A Four-Film Cinematic Event, will be the “first binge-able theatrical experience.” Makes us wonder which Beatle biopic will earn the highest box-office receipts. I’m placing my bet on either Lennon or McCartney, easily the most popular of the four.
“Perhaps this is a chance to understand them a little more deeply,” Mendes said during the event, as quoted in The Guardian. He added that the British boy band “redefined the culture and stayed with you for a lifetime”, and called them “the most significant band of all time.”
Mendes, who is known for his films such as American Beauty and Skyfall, shared that he had been trying to make a film about the Beatles “for years, but I finally gave up,” as the “story was too big for one film” and he didn’t want to resort to making a television series.
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“There had to be a way to tell the epic story for a new generation,” he told the audience, adding: “I can assure you there is still plenty left to explore and I think we found a way to do that.”
Mendes’ Fab Four—Dickinson, Mescal, Keoghan, and Quinn— were present with him on stage at the CinemaCon, where they recited a line from the band’s song Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band: “It’s wonderful to be here, it’s certainly a thrill, you’re such a lovely audience, we’d like to take you home with us.”
To those wondering, Mendes’ project has the blessing of McCartney, now 82, and Starr, 84, and of the families of John Lennon and George Harrison. The biopics are also the first narrative features granted full life story and music rights for a scripted film, per Variety.
Starr, the Beatles’ drummer, told PEOPLE he was “excited to see what [Mendes] does with” the “madness of making four movies at the same time… There’ll be Beatles in mine around when I joined, and there’ll be Beatles in Paul’s. We’ll all be there.”
I was born almost a quarter of a century after the band was formed in 1960, but I grew up listening to and loving The Beatles’ music, thanks to my parents who have the band’s hits in a near-hypnotic loop during weekends. This is why I find the casting so pitch perfect as these four actors are among the most recognizable (and most talented, too) from the UK. They would surely bring The Beatles closer to younger generations, and most likely earn the legendary band a slew of new fans.
They are also among the busiest, each of whom adding a title (or two) to their growing filmography last year. Dickinson was last seen seducing Nicole Kidman in the erotic thriller Babygirl. Mescal, meanwhile, played the titular character in Gladiator II, together with Quinn who played Geta, one-half of the film’s mad emperors. Keoghan also had a busy year, starring in two films— Bird and Bring them Down—amid a high-profile relationship with now-ex flame Sabrina Carpenter.
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Several documentaries have already been made about The Beatles, not including about 18 biopics on the big and small screen. Among the most popular of which are Backbeat (1994), which focuses on sometime guitarist Stuart Sutcliffe, and Nowhere Boy (2009), which is about Lennon’s childhood.
Sony, which is producing the biopics, also unveiled their other upcoming releases during the event, such as the next Tom Holland Spider-Man installment, titled Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which Holland will co-star with real-life beau Zendaya, Karate Kid: Legends, a Zelda film adaptation, and a remake of I Know What You Did Last Summer, among others.
