Mads Mikkelsen has closed a deal to join Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence in Martin Scorsese’s next feature, What Happens at Night, a new book-to-screen adaptation of Peter Cameron’s novel for Apple Original Films. The project is being produced in partnership with Studiocanal.
Scorsese will direct, marking his first time behind the camera since 2023’s 10-time Academy Award–nominated Killers of the Flower Moon. The screenplay is written by Patrick Marber.
Per Deadline, Mikkelsen is expected to play Brother Emmanuel, a faith healer whose reputation draws international visitors to the remote, snowbound town at the center of the story. In the novel, Emmanuel is described as a figure believed by some to cure the incurable, though his powers remain ambiguous and tied to questions of belief. Patricia Clarkson has also joined the expanding ensemble. The production is eyeing a late February start.
For Mikkelsen, this marks his first collaboration with Scorsese, pairing one of European cinema’s most magnetic performers with one of American film’s most revered directors. The Danish actor has built a career on morally complex roles, from his Oscar-winning turn in Another Round to The Hunt, Casino Royale, Doctor Strange and the NBC series Hannibal.
His recent slate includes Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, The Promised Land, the newly released Dust Bunny, and the upcoming sci-fi survival thriller A.M.I. Taking on the enigmatic Brother Emmanuel places Mikkelsen squarely at the center of the film’s spiritual and psychological tension, and marks a notable new chapter in his already wide-ranging career.
A Hitchcockian Reference Point
Several months ago, DiCaprio hinted at the project without naming it, revealing that Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo was serving as a creative touchstone. The actor described conversations with Scorsese about Alfred Hitchcock’s classic as “a religious experience,” noting the director’s fascination with its ambiguity.
“Is she a ghost, or is she not a ghost? Is he a ghost? What is it?” DiCaprio recalled Scorsese asking as they revisited the film.
The comparison is telling. Vertigo is less a ghost story than a psychological spiral — a meditation on identity, projection and obsession. That tonal blueprint appears consistent with Cameron’s novel, which unfolds as a dreamlike descent into uncertainty.
What the Novel Is About
What Happens at Night follows a married American couple who travel to an isolated, snowbound European town to adopt a baby. The wife is undergoing treatment for cancer and arrives physically weakened, raising concerns that her condition could jeopardize the adoption.
They check into a vast, nearly deserted hotel populated by enigmatic figures, including a flamboyant aging actress, a volatile businessman and Brother Emmanuel, a faith healer whose reputation draws the desperate from around the globe. As the couple navigates bureaucratic delays and unsettling encounters, the lines between reality and illusion begin to blur. Questions of belief, identity and marital trust surface, and the story increasingly feels less like a straightforward adoption drama and more like a psychological chamber piece.
Jennifer Lawrence’s Award Buzz and Hunger Games Rumors Fuel Scorsese Role
Jennifer Lawrence enters 2026 riding a wave of critical momentum. She earned award-season recognition for her performance in Lynne Ramsay’s Die, My Love (produced by Scorsese), delivering one of the most emotionally raw turns of her career as a woman grappling with isolation and postpartum depression. The role positioned her firmly back in prestige territory.
Lawrence also reunited with Leonardo DiCaprio for a widely discussed Actors on Actors conversation, during which the two reflected on craft, early careers, and their upcoming collaboration with Martin Scorsese. Meanwhile, industry chatter continues around a potential return to the Hunger Games franchise in Sunrise on the Reaping, which would see her revisit Katniss Everdeen.
Between awards buzz, franchise speculation and another Scorsese pairing on the horizon, Lawrence remains one of the industry’s most closely watched stars — equally at home in arthouse intensity and blockbuster mythology.
Why This Is an Intriguing Move for Scorsese
Scorsese has no shortage of projects in various stages of development. A Hawaiian-set crime drama had DiCaprio, Emily Blunt and Dwayne Johnson attached at one point. A Frank Sinatra biopic and an adaptation of Shūsaku Endō’s The Life of Jesus have also been discussed, while The Devil in the White City has lingered in development for years.
Against that backdrop, What Happens at Night stands out as a more intimate, unsettling proposition. While Scorsese is often associated with crime epics and historical dramas, this material leans into themes he has explored for decades: religious doubt, moral ambiguity, obsession and the fragile architecture of identity. From Taxi Driver to Shutter Island to Silence, his filmography is filled with some of the best characters wrestling with belief and reality.
If DiCaprio’s Vertigo comparison holds, What Happens at Night could mark a return to the psychological unease of Shutter Island, filtered through the existential and spiritual inquiry that has increasingly defined Scorsese’s later work. With a powerhouse cast, Apple’s backing and a story that blends ghostly suggestion with emotional intimacy, the film is shaping up as one of the director’s most enigmatic undertakings in years.
