Jason Schwartzman

Jason Schwartzman (birthname: Jason Francesco Schwartzman) is one of filmmaker Wes Anderson’s most loyal and regular collaborators, as both actor and co-writer, as well as a familiar and quirky presence in several movies by notable filmmakers such as David O. Russell, Roman Coppola (also an Anderson creative partner), Nora Ephron, his cousin Sofia Coppola, Andrew Niccol, Judd Apatow, Edgar Wright, Tim Burton, Alex Ross Perry, Francis Lawrence, Luca Guadagnino, and his uncle Francis Ford Coppola.

Jason Schwartzman’s movie career began, suitably enough, with Anderson, as a star of Rushmore (1998), with Olivia Williams, Bill Murray, Brian Cox, and Seymour Cassel. Schwartzman’s other movies with Anderson comprise a bulk of his career, continuing with The Darjeeling Limited (2007), which Schwartzman co-wrote with Anderson and Roman Coppola; followed by Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), Anderson’s first, brilliant stop-motion animated film, in which Schwartzman performed the voice of Ash Fox; Schwartzman had by now become a fixture in Anderson’s movies, playing Cousin Ben in Moonrise Kingdom (2012)—along with an accompanying short film titled Cousin Ben Troop Screening with Jason Schwartzman.

Schwartzman took on the key role of M. Jean in Anderson’s most acclaimed feature, The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), opposite Ralph Fiennes; Schwartzman’s next two movies with Anderson involved co-writing the scripts (usually with Coppola and Anderson) and acting in both Isle of Dogs (2018) and The French Dispatch (2021); for Anderson’s Asteroid City (2023), Schwartzman handled a double role, as Augie and Jones, in co-lead opposite Scarlett Johansson and Tom Hanks.

Jason Schwartzman’s other continuous string of artistic collaborations have been with his fellow Coppola family members—first with Roman, who was writer-director of CQ (2001), with Schwartzman handling a supporting role opposite Jeremy Davies, Billy Zane Angela Lindvall, Elodie Bouchez, Gerard Depardieu, Giancarlo Giannini, John Philip Law, and Dean Stockwell. Schwartzman’s second movie with director-writer-producer Roman Coppola was the comedy, A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III (2012), with Charlie Sheen, Bill Murray, and Patricia Arquette.

With cousin Sofia Coppola (who directed and wrote), Schwartzman played King Louis XVI opposite Kirsten Dunst in the title role, Marie Antoinette (2006), with Judy Davis, Rip Torn, Rose Byrne, Asia Argento, Molly Shannon, Shirley Henderson, Danny Huston, and Steve Coogan, and which premiered at the Cannes film festival. Jason Schwartzman’s next Coppola family member as director was cousin Gia Coppola, who was the director/co-writer/co-producer of a movie about moviemaking, Mainstream (2020), a poorly reviewed film which premiered at the Venice Film Festival and co-starred Andrew Garfield, Ethan Hawke, and Nat Wolff.

Although it took a while, Schwartzman finally worked with Uncle Francis Ford Coppola, who cast his nephew in a prominent role in the director-writer-producer’s long-awaited, much-delayed, and finally completed epic, Megalopolis (date to be announced), starring Adam Driver, Forest Whitaker, Nathalie Emmanuel, Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Talia Shire (Schwartzman’s mother), Dustin Hoffman, D.B. Sweeney, and Giancarlo Esposito.

Beyond Anderson and the Coppolas, Jason Schwartzman’s eclectic career includes the lead in the college comedy, Slackers (2002), with Devon Sawa and Jason Segel, followed by another lead in the Jonas Åkerlund-directed crime comedy, Spun (2002), with John Leguizamo, Mena Suvari, Patrick Fugit, Peter Stormare, Deborah Harry, Eric Roberts, and Mickey Rourke. Schwartzman played support in director-writer-producer Andrew Niccol’s sci-fi satire, S1m0ne (2002), starring Al Pacino, Catherine Keener, Evan Rachel Wood and Winona Ryder, and then joined the hyperactive ensemble of David O. Russell’s black comedy, I Heart Huckabees (2004), with Dustin Hoffman, Mark Wahlberg, Naomi Watts, Isabelle Huppert, Jude Law, and Lily Tomlin.

For one of his first studio credits, Jason Schwartzman was cast by Nora Ephron (who was director, co-writer, and co-producer) in her re-conception of the hit 60s TV series, Bewitched (2005), co-starring Nicole Kidman and Will Ferrell, with Steve Carell, Shirley MacLaine, and Michael Caine.

Schwartzman earned a Satellite Award nomination for his supporting turn in star-writer Steve Martin’s Shopgirl (2005), with Claire Danes and directed by Anand Tucker, followed by another supporting performance in another studio comedy, Judd Apatow’s Funny People (2009), with Adam Sandler, Seth Rogen, Leslie Mann, Eric Bana, and Jonah Hill. After the barely-seen The Marc Pease Experience (2009), in which Schwartzman played the title role opposite Ben Stiller, Schwartzman appeared in Edgar Wright’s brilliant cult movie, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010), starring Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Allison Pill, Kieran Culkin, Chris Evans, and Anna Kendrick. In a surprising turn, Schwartzman enacted the Mary Poppins co-composer, Richard M. Sherman, in Disney’s Saving Mr. Banks (2013), with Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks, Colin Farrell, Paul Giamatti, and Bradley Whitford, grossing $118 million globally.

Jason Schwartzman appeared in intense back-to-back movies made by indie filmmaker Alex Ross Perry—first, as star of the Sundance-premiering Listen Up Philip (2014), with Elisabeth Moss and Jonathan Pryce, and then in the ensemble of Perry’s next Sundance premiere, Golden Exits (2017), with Emily Browning, Adam Horovitz, Mary-Louise Parker, Lily Rabe, and Chloë Sevigny. With filmmaker Tim Burton, Schwartzman joined the cast of the biopic, Big Eyes (2014), with Amy Adams, Christoph Waltz, Danny Huston, and Terence Stamp, and then co-starred with Adam Scott, Taylor Schilling, and Judith Godreche in writer-director Patrick Brice’s sex comedy, The Overnight (2015), which premiered at the Sundance film festival.

The next indie comedy for Schwartzman—this time in the starring role—was in writer-director Bob Byington’s 7 Chinese Brothers (2015), with Stephen Root, Olympia Dukakis, and Perry, and then Schwartzman acted with yet another family member—his half-brother Robert Schwartzman (as director, co-writer, and co-producer)—in the musical comedy-drama, Dreamland (2016), with Amy Landecker and Beverly D’Angelo. Jason Schwartzman’s second voice performance in an animated movie was the lead role in filmmaker Dash Shaw’s Toronto-premiering My Entire High School Sinking into the Sea (2016), with the voices of Reggie Watts, Maya Rudolph, Lena Dunham, Susan Sarandon, Alex Karpovsky, and John Cameron Mitchell.

Schwartzman’s most significant voice role in an animated feature was as the antagonist Spot in the second and third installments of the hugely successful Phil Lord/Christopher Miller re-imagining of the Spider-Man tale, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023) and Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse (2024), alongside the voice cast members of Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, and Bryan Tyree Henry.

Jason Schwartzman was cast in another major franchise sequel, as “Lucky” Flickerman in Lionsgate’s The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes (2023), directed by Francis Lawrence, and co-starring Tom Blyth, Rachel Zegler, Peter Dinklage, and Viola Davis. Schwartzman was cast by director-producer Luca Guadagnino in major support opposite Daniel Craig, Drew Starkey, and Lesley Manville in screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes’ adaptation of William S. Burrough’s drama, Queer (date to be announced). Schwartzman then starred opposite Carol Kane, Caroline Aaron, Dolly De Leon, and Robert Smigel in writer-director Nathan Silver’s crisis-of-faith comedy, Between the Temples (date to be announced).