Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi are reportedly set to star in Emerald Fennell’s upcoming film adaptation of Emily Brontë’s classic novel, Wuthering Heights.
The casting news was initially shared by Justin Kroll in Deadline, who noted that the film will be financed by MRC and produced by LuckyChap. This project marks the third collaboration between Fennell and LuckyChap, which also produced the films Saltburn and Promising Young Woman, the latter of which earned Fennell an Academy Award for best original screenplay.
Filming for Wuthering Heights is scheduled to begin in the UK in 2025, with Robbie portraying Catherine Earnshaw and Elordi taking on the role of Heathcliff. Brontë’s original novel, released in 1850, narrates the struggles of the Earnshaw and Linton families and their connection to Heathcliff, the foster son of the Earnshaws. The choice of Elordi, a white Australian actor, has sparked controversy since Heathcliff is described as dark-skinned in the novel.
Robbie was last seen as both the star and producer of the blockbuster Barbie, which earned $1.4 billion worldwide and received eight Oscar nominations, including best picture. She is also set to appear in Kogonada’s A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, slated for release next year.
Elordi was featured in Fennell’s Saltburn and played Elvis Presley in Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, which premiered in 2023. He will also be starring in Daniel Minahan’s On Swift Horses and participating in a remake of Frankenstein directed by Guillermo del Toro.
In a January interview with Variety, Robbie praised Fennell’s direction in Saltburn, stating: “Emerald immerses you into a world so quickly. She’s so masterful at tone and plot…She gets in your brain and she kind of taps into the most depraved parts of it, so that you’re complicit in the story. That’s the watercooler moment — the thing that people are talking about two weeks afterwards.”
Fennell co-founded LuckyChap, which produced Barbie and Saltburn, among other projects, as well as its initial live off-Broadway production, The Big Gay Jamboree.