Alexander Payne is packing his bags for Italy: The Oscar winner has been announced as the Venice Film Festival jury president.
The 82nd Venice Film Festival will take place from August 27 to September 6. Payne and the rest of the jury will decide the Golden Lion winner for the best film, among other awards such as the Silver Lions for Grand Jury Prize and best director, Volpi Cup for best actress and best actor, the screenplay award, the Special Jury Prize, and the Marcello Mastroianni Award for best new young actor or actress.
“It’s an enormous honor and joy to serve on the jury at Venice,” Payne said in a press statement. “Although I share a filmmaker’s ambivalence about comparing films against one another, I revere the Venice Film Festival’s nearly 100-year history of loudly celebrating film as an art form. I couldn’t be more excited.”
Past Jury Presidents have included Isabelle Huppert (2024), Damien Chazelle (2023), Julianne Moore (2022), Bong Joon Ho (2021), and Cate Blanchett (2020). Alberto Barbera, the cirector of the Venice Film Festival, recommends each president.
“Alexander Payne belongs to the small circle of filmmakers-cinephiles whose passion for cinema is fueled by knowledge of films of the past and curiosity about contemporary cinema, without boundaries or barriers of any kind,” Barbera said. “These qualities — along with his experience as a screenwriter — make him an ideal candidate to preside over the work of the Venice Jury, which is called upon to evaluate films from around the world. I am grateful to Alexander for accepting my invitation, which seals an acquaintance that goes back to the days of his graduation short film at UCLA.”
Payne has won two Oscars for Best Adapted Screenplay with “Sideways” (2004) and “The Descendants” (2011). His 2023 film “The Holdovers” won Best Supporting Actress for Da’Vine Joy Randolph. The director will revisit his 1999 film “Election” for the sequel “Tracy Flick Can’t Win,” with Reese Witherspoon reprising her role and also producing. The project was announced in December 2022. Payne is additionally working on a Western film and reuniting with “The Holdovers” scribe David Hemingson for that script.
Payne will also shoot a Danish-language film in rural Denmark.
