Ethan Hawke Says His Next One With Richard Linklater Will Be “Among the Greatest Films Ever Made”

Richard Linklater released two films this year, “Nouvelle Vague” and “Blue Moon,” both terrific, and after having released four films in the last four years, he’s still not slowing down.

For some time, Linklater has been planning a film concerning transcendentalism, a literary movement that included Margaret Fuller, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Henry David Thoreau. It’s a fascinating part of history that Linklater wants to turn into — what else — a hangout movie. Last we heard, Natalie Portman, Oscar Isaac, and — who else — Ethan Hawke were attached to star.

Now, speaking with Today, Hawke says that he and Linklater are already working on their 10th movie together — and he’s predicting a film bound for the time capsule.

Hawke: Everything has been in preparation for what's to come. The 10th is going to be the best.

Today: That's a bold statement.

Hawke: I'm not even nervous about saying it. We've been thinking about this movie since about 1998. He's been thinking about it longer than that. He's had this dream for a long time in his head, and it's going to be good [..] personally, I believe It will be among the greatest films ever made.

Today: Wow

Hawke: We’re shooting it [in 2026] and I'll be back on your show in about 18 months to back it up.

Hawke added that the movie, will probably be released in 2027, and is a “period piece,” which basically confirms he’s referring to the transcendentalist project.

In a recent interview with Filmmaker Magazine, Linklater said the film — about the “hippies of the 1830s and ’40s, the beginnings of feminism, environmentalism, abolitionism, all that” — is a kind of 19th-century hangout movie and has been in the works for around 20 years. Hawke is set to portray Emerson, while Portman hopes to play Margaret Fuller and Isaac would portray Henry David Thoreau.

Although this project isn’t the most, shall we say, luring topic for prospective buyers, Linklater believes it may finally be “coming together,” since “people feel a certain urgency to help it in a way that I’m grateful for.”

Through it all, and with nearly 35 years of filmmaking under his belt, Linklater has built an extraordinary body of work: “Dazed and Confused,” “Before Sunrise,” “Before Sunset,” “Before Midnight,” “Boyhood,” “Waking Life,” “School of Rock,” “Everybody Wants Some!!,” “Me and Orson Welles,” “Bernie,” and “Apollo 10½.”