What to Love About HBO Max’s ‘The Last Movie Stars’

It has been slightly a bumpy path for HBO Max’s The Last Movie Stars to reach its audiences. The documentary series initially launched at the South Film Festival and later had a screening at the Cannes Film Festival in the first six months of 2022.

However, The Last Movie Stars was initially meant to launch on the CNN+ streaming platform as an original before the streamer dissolved. HBO Max warmly welcomed the series into its premises.

The documentary series is meant to acknowledge the talent, personas, and Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward’s love story in an exciting manner. It springs from a task that Paul Newman had commissioned a screenwriter and friend Stewart Stern to work on years ago. 

Stern was commissioned to interview artist collaborators, family and close friends, including Newman himself, Joanne Woodward, Jacqueline Witte, Gore Vidal, Sidney Pollack, Karl Malden, Sidney Lumet, and Elia Kazan, among others, for a narrative that Newman intended to do. 

The interviews featured Newman’s young days, his marriage, the loss of his son, Scott, and other personal demons. According to the four times Oscar appointee director Ethan Hawke, the interview recordings have gone missing, but the transcripts still exist. 

Hawke also recorded interviews with a few of Newman’s daughters and others like Martin Scorsese, the series’ chief producer and Sally Field to add to Newman’s relationship and careers. 

To display all this, The Last Movie Stars utilizes several actresses and actors from today to read all these transcripts accompanied by archival footage.

Some talented characters in the series include The White Lotus’ Steve Zahn, Sam Rockwell, Zoe Kazan of The Big Sick, Josh Hamilton of The Walking Dead, Billy Crudup of The Morning Show, and Bobby Cannavale of Nine Perfect Strangers. 

Other characters include Brooks Ashmanskas of The Good Lord Bird, Laura Linney playing Joanne Woodward, and George Clooney portraying Paul Newman.

Joining Scorsese as chief producers are Courtney Sexton and Amy Entelis, with Mario Andretti as the co-producer. 

The series is produced by Lisa L. Adler, Emily Wachtel of Nook House Productions, Adam Gibbs, and Under the Influence Production’s Ryan Hawke.

The Last Movie Stars launches this Thursday, July 21st, on HBO Max with all six episodes. 

In the meantime, you can enjoy the official trailer.