Taylor Swift Is Making Her Feature Film Directorial Debut With Searchlight

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Taylor Swift is planning to make her feature film directorial debut with Searchlight Pictures, the production company announced on Friday—as the Grammy-winning pop star searches for her first Oscar with her short film All Too Well.

Taylor Swift is making her feature length directorial debut with production company Searchlight … [+] Pictures.

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Key Facts

In a joint statement, Searchlight Pictures Presidents David Greenbaum and Matthew Greenfield extolled Swift as a “once in a generation artist and storyteller,” saying it’s a “genuine joy and privilege to collaborate with her,” Deadline first reported.

The production company, which has produced Oscar-winning films Nomadland (2020) and The Shape of Water (2017), did not release the name of the film or any actors who might star in it, although it did announce Swift has written an original script.

More information about the film will be released at a later date, the company said.

Tangent

Last week, more than two dozen Swift fans sued Ticketmaster in a class-action lawsuit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court accusing the ticket seller and its parent company, Live Nation, of holding a monopoly on the primary and secondary ticket markets, and breaking antitrust laws by price fixing. Roughly 14 million fans tried to buy pre-sale tickets to Swift’s upcoming 2023 tour, according to Live Nation, CNBC reported. The botched ticket sales created a wave of pushback against the site, with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) accusing Ticketmaster of holding a monopoly, following its merger with Live Nation. Company chair Greg Maffei said the concert was promoted by a competitor—AEG—which chose to work with Ticketmaster to sell tickets.

Surprising Fact

Swift, an 11-time Grammy award winner and 46-time nominee, said on Wednesday she would trade places with director Guillermo del Toro, whose 2018 film The Shape of Water was produced by Searchlight Pictures and won the Academy Award for best feature film. “Imagine having that imagination, that visual vocabulary and that astonishing body of work,” Swift said about del Toro.

Key Background

The announcement comes one day after the 32-year-old country-turned-pop star released behind-the-scenes footage of the making of the short film that accompanied the 10-minute version of her 2012 song “All Too Well”—which she shot on 35-millimeter film. That short film won three MTV Video Music Awards for video of the year, best longform video and best direction. It also won the American Music Award for favorite music video. Swift said in September she “will always want to tell human stories about human emotion,” and when asked about directing, answered, “if it were the right thing, it would be such a privilege and honor,” she said at the Toronto Film Festival.

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