‘Eleanor the Great’ Writer Reveals the Surprising Story Behind Scarlett Johansson’s Directorial Debut [Exclusive]

As part of Collider’s Exclusive Preview event for Fall movies, we’re thrilled to exclusively debut a deeper look at Eleanor the Great, Scarlett Johansson’s bold and unsettling directorial debut, based on a screenplay by Tory Kamen. The film stars June Squibb as a 94-year-old woman who tells a life-altering lie — not to deceive the world, but to feel like she belongs in it.

“When I started writing Eleanor,” Kamen told Collider, “I thought about the different ways people lie to feel like they belong. I remember doing that as a kid, shapeshifting my way into cooler friend groups or pretending to like some awful band to impress a guy. Ideally, your sense of self kicks in, and eventually, you stop bending to the will of someone else’s want. But I was curious what happens when that impulse follows us into adulthood, and the need to be chosen overrides authenticity.”

That curiosity became a daring script, one that asked: Is there something you’d never expect to hear a loved one tell you?

“That’s what led me to a more unsettling question: what was the worst lie I could imagine coming from someone I love (in this case, my beloved and deeply unproblematic grandmother Elinore) and would I still love them anyway?”

What Is ‘Eleanor the Great’ About?

Set in New York, the story follows Eleanor Morgenstein, a sharp-tongued Florida retiree who moves back in with her daughter (Jessica Hecht) and grandson after the death of her best friend Bessie (Rita Zohar). Encouraged to socialize, Eleanor stumbles into a trauma survivors group at a local Jewish center — and pretends to be one of them. As her lies snowball, she bonds with Nina (Erin Kellyman), a young woman seeking answers after the sudden loss of her mother.

The role of Eleanor could easily crumble under its own contradictions, but Squibb makes the impossible feel intimate. Her performance is layered with defiance, loneliness, wit, and a vulnerability that makes Eleanor’s deceptions feel not excusable, but heartbreakingly human. When the film places her in front of a Bat Mitzvah Torah portion about Jacob and Esau — a tale of stolen identity — the metaphor lands like a gut punch.

The film’s central conceit — a woman co-opting a Holocaust survivor’s story — is, as Kamen surely anticipated, a minefield. In an era of fake news and social media misinformation, a story like this could easily collapse under its own weight. But Johansson and Kamen don’t ask us to forgive Eleanor. They ask us to look closely. The point isn’t that Eleanor’s actions are forgivable — they’re not — but that they’re understandable, in the way all human contradictions are. It’s a moral tightrope that the film walks carefully. As Kamen put it, Eleanor the Great is ultimately about “what happens when the need to be chosen overrides authenticity.” It’s a haunting question, and the film doesn’t let you forget it.

Eleanor the Great premiered in Cannes this spring and is set to screen at TIFF next month before arriving in theaters via Sony Pictures Classics on September 26, 2025. Check out more exciting reveals from Collider’s Exclusive Preview now!

Eleanor the Great

Release Date

September 26, 2025

Runtime

98 minutes

Writers

Tory Kamen

Producers

Celine Rattray, Charlotte Dauphin, Jessamine Burgum, Jonathan Lia, Kara Durrett, Keenan Flynn, Scarlett Johansson, Trudie Styler