Jacob Elordi and Rosamund Pike Will Play English Aristocrats in Emerald Fennell’s Follow-Up to ‘Promising Young Woman’

Emerald Fennell’s feature directorial debut earned her an Oscar, and now the British multihyphenate’s next film, Saltburn, looks set to establish her as an industry heavyweight. Here’s everything we know so far.

The headlines:

Who’s in the cast of Saltburn?

Rosamund Pike, Jacob Elordi, and Barry Keoghan are the stars of Saltburn.

What’s the plot of Saltburn?

It’s still shrouded in mystery, but Saltburn has been described as a story about obsession centered on an aristocratic English family.

When will Saltburn be released?

A release date has yet to be confirmed but filming is due to start this summer.

The details:

It’s Emerald Fennell’s hotly anticipated return to the big screen

Since winning the Oscar for best original screenplay in 2021 for her fiery feature directorial debut, *Promising Young Woman—*not to mention becoming one of only eight women to be nominated for the best director prize in the Academy’s 94-year history—the filmmaker has collaborated with Andrew Lloyd Webber on his reimagined Cinderella, but has so far refrained from returning to the director’s chair. That will change with Saltburn, which she is directing, writing, and producing. We’re crossing our fingers for a surprise cameo too—in her first film, Fennell appeared in a hysterically funny uncredited role as the host of a make-up tutorial video that her vengeful heroine Cassie (Carey Mulligan) takes cues from.

Rosamund Pike is taking the lead

Another Oscar-nominated star will be center stage this time around: Rosamund Pike, who’ll be making her first film since 2020’s I Care A Lot, in which she was deliciously brittle as ruthless con artist Marla Grayson and won a Golden Globe in the process. The actor has been going from strength to strength in recent years, delivering critically lauded performances in everything from the harrowing A Private War to the hilarious State of the Union, and, providing Saltburn lives up to expectations, it could easily pave the way for her second Oscar nod. (She was previously recognized for embodying the terrifying Amy Dunne in 2014’s Gone Girl.)

Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan are also on board

Joining Pike? None other than rising stars Jacob Elordi—the Australian heartthrob who is coming off of a record-breaking second season of Euphoria and currently fielding Bond rumors—and Irish actor Barry Keoghan, the new Joker in Matt Reeves’s The Batman who will next be seen in Martin McDonagh’s The Banshees of Inisherin alongside Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson.

The film is set to follow a family of aristocrats

While plot points are being kept carefully under wraps, Deadline has reported that Saltburn will be “a story of obsession” with the focus on “a grand, aristocratic English family.” Fennell is well positioned to tell such a story: Her father is the British jewelry designer Theo Fennell, a frequent presence at high society parties according to his recently published memoir, and she herself attended Marlborough College, whose alumni include Princess Eugenie and the Duchess of Cambridge. Playing a young Camilla Shand, later the Duchess of Cornwall, in two seasons of The Crown can’t have hurt either.

Margot Robbie is among the producers

MRC is the studio behind the film and LuckyChap Entertainment, the company Margot Robbie runs with her husband, Tom Ackerley, is producing. Better yet, this project isn’t the only one on which Robbie and Fennell are collaborating: In April, the latter joined the cast of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, in which the former plays the titular convertible-driving, pink-obsessed doll.

It could hit screens sooner than you might think

Principal photography for Saltburn is scheduled to begin in the U.K. this summer. Considering that Promising Young Woman was shot in just 23 days and debuted at the 2020 edition of the Sundance Film Festival only 10 months later, Fennell’s latest could feasibly arrive in cinemas by the summer of 2023. If it does, expect it to be one of the frontrunners for awards glory come 2024.