A space-age love story centered around NASA’s historic Voyager probes and the Golden Record that hitched a ride onboard might not seem like the most engaging of cinematic projects, but when the true-life persons whose real romance is involved are the famed astronomer Carl Sagan and documentary filmmaker Ann Druyan, it’s bound to draw an abundance of interested parties.
Academy Award winning director Sebastian Lelio (“A Fantastic Woman”) is attached to helm FilmNation Entertainment’s next feature film project, “Voyagers,” which takes place in the late-1970s when NASA was prepping to send the pair of interstellar Voyager probes out to the edge of our solar system and beyond.
To add buzz to this upcoming biopic, Variety recently reported (opens in new tab) that Andrew Garfield is signed on to play the legendary astronomer/astrophysicist Carl Sagan with Daisy Edgar-Jones portraying his love interest and “Cosmos” filmmaker Ann Druyan.
Related: Carl Sagan: Cosmos, Pale Blue Dot & famous quotes
Garfield played the web-slinging Peter Parker in director Marc Webb’s “The Amazing Spider-Man” (2012) and “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” (2014), and was featured in 2021’s “Spider-Man: No Way Home.” “Voyagers” will be a reunion of sorts as he also starred beside Edgar-Jones in FX’s Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award nominated “Under the Banner of Heaven.”
The story emerges back in 1977 while NASA gets ready to launch the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 probes as Sagan’s team creates the Golden Record, a gold-plated 12-inch copper disc created with global images and messages to be included on each spacecraft as a greeting from Earth. What begins as a critical time-sensitive mission transforms into a budding romance between Sagan and Druyan.
“As a nine-year-old boy growing up during Chile’s dictatorship, Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan’s TV series ‘Cosmos’ had a profound impact on me, igniting my fascination with life’s biggest questions and mysteries,” Lelio told Variety (opens in new tab). “It is a dream to make a movie about the Golden Record and, within it, the inspiring love story between Carl and Ann. I’m thrilled that Andrew Garfield and Daisy Edgar-Jones will be at the center of this epic romance set against the infinite backdrop of space and time.”
Lelio’s last project was the hauntingly tragic period piece on Netflix titled, “The Wonder,” starring Florence Pugh and produced by House Productions and Element Pictures. This unsettling and beautifully-shot movie was nominated for Outstanding British Film of the Year at BAFTA in 2022.
“Voyagers” will be produced by Ben Browning for FilmNation Entertainment, Lynda Obst, and Druyan. This should be a highly sought-after project at this year’s Cannes Film Festival market.
“Imagine falling madly, truly in love with one of the greatest humans who ever lived, while creating a complex message about what it is to be alive, a golden record affixed to the first interstellar spacecraft launched by our species, bound to sail the Milky Way galaxy long after Earth ceases to exist,” said Druyan (opens in new tab). “It takes a movie to bring that mythic experience, that cosmic love story to vivid life. After years of searching, I feel that we have found exactly the right colleagues and artists to capture the magic of it.”
