Leonardo DiCaprio Spills Shocking Secrets About Martin Scorsese's Next Movie

Leonardo DiCaprio just dropped a juicy little hint about his next run with Martin Scorsese, and it’s a good one: they’re aiming for a Vertigo vibe. Yes, the Alfred Hitchcock movie. They’re teaming on an adaptation of Peter Cameron’s novel 'What Happens at Night' — their first team-up since 2023’s excellent crime drama 'Killers of the Flower Moon' — and it sounds like this one’s going to be icy, eerie, and very deliberately unnerving.

The Vertigo of it all

On The Big Picture podcast, DiCaprio said their new project is taking cues from Hitchcock’s 1958 psychological thriller 'Vertigo' — the James Stewart/Kim Novak classic. Inside baseball alert: that’s a very specific mood board for Scorsese to riff on, especially if he’s leaning into obsession, identity, and maybe-she’s-a-ghost energy.

"I’m working on a film where [Vertigo] is a reference point. Had a conversation with Marty about it. Any time you get to see and talk movies with him, it’s a religious experience. But when he talks about a movie that he’s still trying to figure out, he’s like, you know, 'Each decade that movie means something different to me. Is she a ghost, or is she not a ghost? Is she there? Is he a ghost?' So yeah, there’s something we’re working on that’s a reference to that."

What this thing actually is

'What Happens at Night' is Scorsese directing from a script by Patrick Marber, adapting Cameron’s book. DiCaprio stars alongside Jennifer Lawrence — their first movie together since 2021’s 'Don’t Look Up.' Fun wrinkle: Scorsese is producing Lawrence’s 'Die, My Love,' but this will be the first time he’s actually directing her.

The setup is simple on paper and very not-simple in the execution: an American couple heads to a small, snow-buried European town to adopt a baby. They check into a cavernous, mostly empty hotel and start crossing paths with a cast of very particular strangers — a flamboyant chanteuse, a corrupt businessman, a magnetic faith healer. As they try to secure the child, the place gets stranger and their grip on who they are gets looser. Nothing is what it looks like, which is exactly where that Vertigo reference starts to make sense.

Who’s doing what, and when

• Director: Martin Scorsese
• Screenplay: Patrick Marber, adapting Peter Cameron’s novel 'What Happens at Night'
• Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lawrence
• Context: DiCaprio and Scorsese last worked together on 2023’s 'Killers of the Flower Moon'; Lawrence previously co-starred with DiCaprio in 2021’s 'Don’t Look Up'
• Note: Scorsese is a producer on Lawrence’s 'Die, My Love,' but this is his first time directing her
• Financing/production: Apple Original Films is in negotiations to finance and produce the projects with StudioCanal (yes, plural is how it’s being framed right now)
• Timeline: Filming is expected to start in January 2026
• Release date: Not set

Bottom line: Scorsese channeling 'Vertigo' for a chilly, off-kilter adoption drama set in a near-empty hotel with a maybe-haunted cast of characters? That’s the good kind of weird.