Julia Roberts To Make First Cannes Appearance With George Clooney’s ‘Money Monster’
Julia Roberts is a top-tier actress who has attended her share of awards ceremonies and prestigious film festivals. However, this May will mark the first time one of her movies screens at the Cannes Film Festival in France. Roberts co-stars with George Clooney in the Jodie Foster-directed Money Monster about a live on-air hostage-taking. Variety reports that Foster most recently had a film in Cannes in 2011, with the Mel Gibson-starring The Beaver.
In a trailer for Money Monster posted by The Hollywood Reporter, Clooney is shown as a charismatic television personality giving bullish investment advice. Roberts plays his producer who must navigate the scene when a man arrives on set with a gun and takes Clooney’s character hostage. Money Monster runs in real time and also stars Jack O’Connell as the gunman.
This is not the first time Clooney and Roberts have paired up on screen. They starred in Ocean’s Eleven in 2001 and its sequel, Ocean’s Twelve, in 2004. Clooney was a producer on Roberts’ 2013 film August in Orange County. During press for County, Clooney joked that Roberts was easy to work with because “you just offer her booze, apply that with anything.”
Foster, best known for her work in front of the camera, has been steadily building her directing resume. In addition to Money Monster and The Beaver, she directed two episodes of Orange is the New Black and one episode of House of Cards. Back in the 1990s she sat in the director’s chair on Little Man Tate and Home For the Holidays.
Roberts is said to be starring in an upcoming film based on a man in New York City who has been accused of repeatedly posing as a transit official. She will play the man’s lawyer, which may bode well for Roberts’ award show chances since in 2001 she won an Oscar for playing a crusading employee in a law office in Erin Brockovich.
While promoting her film Secrets in Their Eyes last fall, Roberts weighed in on the gender pay gap controversy and Jennifer Lawrence’s thoughtful take on the topic. Lawrence had recently written an op-ed stating she’d wished she’d asked for more money for her part in American Hustle. Lawrence’s male co-stars earned significantly more for their roles in the film.
Roberts told ABC she appreciates Lawrence’s willingness to speak up.
“I applaud her. She’s a young, fabulous, talented whippersnapper and I love that she’s stirring things up.
“I mean, she just — she’s so energetic and seems to speak her mind and I think it’s great. I think it’s great to kind of shake things up. I think it’s great to go, ‘Excuse me. Over here. I know something now and I’m frustrated by it and why is this?'”
Roberts, 48, has three children with husband Danny Moder: 10-year-old twins and an 8-year-old. Moder was a cinematographer on Secrets in Their Eyes.
Clooney has been busy during this election season, throwing his support behind Hillary Clinton. He’s spoken well of both Clinton and Bernie Sanders, but revealed his intentions to have a pricey fundraiser on Clinton’s behalf. Clooney is known for his political activism and his long relationship with the Democratic Party.
Money Monster will debut at Cannes Film Festival on May 11. It will open in the U.S. on May 13. Cannes runs from May 11 to 22 with George Miller at the helm of the competition jury.
[Photo by Mike Windle/Getty Images]
