EXCLUSIVE: Steven Soderbergh is out to the town with an untitled feature doc, centered on the final interview of John Lennon, multiple sources tell Deadline.
This is the first doc in many years for Soderbergh, who released And Everything Is Going Fine — on the life of multi-hyphenate artist Spalding Gray — through Sundance Selects in 2010. We’re told Soderbergh is in production now, and the search for a distributor is on, with the film to be completed by end of year.
EPs on the project include Soderbergh, Michael Sugar and David Hillman of Sugar23, and Nancy Saslow and David Hudson of Mishpookah Entertainment Group.
Lennon’s final in-depth interview took place alongside wife and creative collaborator Yoko Ono on the fateful day of December 8, 1980 — the only radio interview granted around the release of their album, Double Fantasy. That afternoon, the pair met a team of three from RKO Radio at their Dakota apartment. The conversation was extraordinary and wide-ranging, reflecting the duo’s open and reflective moods. John had just turned 40 and emerged from a five-year hiatus from the music industry to care for his son, Sean. The future seemed limitless.
A matter of 12 hours later, though, Lennon was dead — gunned down by Mark David Chapman outside the couple’s New York City apartment building. The most haunting line from the interview would have to be Lennon telling journalists, “I consider that my work won’t be finished until I’m dead and buried, and I hope that’s a long, long time.”
As ever, there’s ample interest in The Beatles, perhaps the most iconic group in rock history, and looking at their story from all angles. Currently looking to do so in the narrative space is Sam Mendes, who as we were first to report, is putting together four interconnected biopics on Lennon and his band mates, all of which will be released in April 2028, in an experimental move.
Soderbergh is coming off of the London shoot for The Christophers, his dark comedy starring Ian McKellen, Michaela Coel, James Corden, and Jessica Gunning, on which we were first to report. Ever prolific, Soderbergh in March unveiled his critically lauded spy thriller Black Bag, starring Cate Blanchett, Michael Fassbender, and Regé-Jean Page, two months prior to that unveiling the Neon psychological thriller Presence.
Soderbergh is repped by WME, Sugar23, and Lichter, Grossman, Nichols.
