Maintain on to your butts, Nathan Fielder and Emma Stone are re-teaming for the brand new film Checkmate, in line with the Hollywood Reporter. It’s an adaptation of Ben Mezrich’s upcoming non-fiction guide of the identical title, which dives right into a 2022 scandal that rocked the chess world.
Fielder and Stone final blew our minds with The Curse, a black comedy at Showtime. This time round Fielder is about to direct whereas Stone’s Fruit Tree banner will produce. The entire mission shall be led by A24, which blew away gives from a lot bigger studios with a reported seven-figure assure. “I’ve by no means seen A24 try this earlier than,” THR quotes one insider saying. And what may make A24 this excited?
In 2022, on the St. Louis cease on the Grand Chess Tour, 19-year-old Hans Niemann upset Magnus Carlsen, the 31-year-old world No. 1 and arguably the strongest participant of all time. As a chess nerd who adopted that sport dwell, it felt like when the highest tennis seed loses within the first spherical of a significant — uncommon sufficient to boost eyebrows, however not completely stunning. Then one thing unprecedented occurred: Carlsen withdrew from the match whereas his group leaked to the media that Niemann had cheated.
Rumors had dogged Niemann for years, and Chess.com later confirmed he did cheat in on-line play. However getting assist on-line is as simple as opening a second browser window, whereas dishonest over the board at a prime match is way more durable: Rivals go by means of metallic detectors, telephones are banned, and screens patrol the enjoying corridor. Additionally, to many observers, it didn’t appear to be Carlsen had been slowly squeezed by a superior mechanical thoughts, which is how pc vs. grandmaster often goes down. As a substitute, it form of appeared like Carlsen blundered within the endgame, after which threw a match when he misplaced.
Subsequent got here the questions: How precisely would Niemann have cheated? Memes had the solutions, and a never-serious however fairly amusing principle about vibrating anal beads went viral. It’s been nearly two years since then, and within the interim each Carlsen and Niemann have taken practically each alternative to make themselves look extra silly. Should you solely know Nathan Fielder, or if you happen to solely observe chess, you haven’t any concept how good these two are for one another.
Stone’s collaboration with Fielder is only one of many inventive partnerships which can be at present bearing fruit. After she received an Oscar with Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Issues, she’s starring in his subsequent movie, Sorts of Kindness, and she or he was just lately credited with an help on Taylor Swift’s “Florida!!!” Stone additionally just lately joined the solid of one other A24 movie, Ari Aster’s Eddington.
