Jacob Elordi MAN MADE

WITH A SLATE OF DARK AND DARING PRESTIGE PROJECTS, THE BRISBANEBORN BREAKOUT IS EMBRACING A BOLD NEW CHAPTER

- Jennie Noonan

In the second half of 2023, Brisbane-born actor Jacob Elordi – previously known for his roles as broody high-schoolers – levelled up his career with his hyped turn as a privileged party boy in Emerald Fennell's darkly comic thriller Saltburn and his transformation into Elvis Presley for Sofia Coppola-directed biopic Priscilla. Turns out, he was just getting started.

“The one thing that I’m lucky enough now to have is the ability to choose a little bit,” he told Vanity Fair in December 2023.

“I just want to work with artists. I’ve loved art my whole life, really, and I just want to work with filmmakers who have a specific point of view or a feeling ... and they want to leave that mark on the world.”

While work kept coming – including playing a young Richard Gere in movie Oh, Canada and a WWII prisoner of war in miniseries The Narrow Road to the Deep North – Elordi’s pinch-me moment came when he lined up gigs adapting two of the most famous stories in literature. First, he was cast as the monster in Guillermo del Toro’s decades-in-the-making Netflix epic, Frankenstein, then he scored a starring role as Heathcliff opposite Margot Robbie in Fennell’s highly anticipated take on Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel, Wuthering Heights.

“It’s the coolest thing ever. I’m spoiled for the rest of my life in movies. What do you do?” the 28-year-old said in an April interview with Collider. “I had the best time on both films, and the language was so rich. The cinematic language of Guillermo and of Emerald was so incredibly unreal, and the sets were so deeply impressive. I can’t believe that I’ve been a part of two movies like this because they just don't make movies of that scale anymore, and I've just done two back-to-back. I couldn't be prouder or more excited for people to see those films.”