A four-part Beatles biopic is currently in the works, directed by Oscar winner Sam Mendes, penned by industry stalwarts Jez Butterworth, Peter Straughan, and Jack Thorne, and starring some of the most in-demand actors working today. Before the four interconnected films—one from each band member’s point of view—hit the big screen in April 2028, here’s a full breakdown of who’s playing who in the Beatles biopic.
Paul Mescal as Paul McCartney
The Irish Oscar nominee, currently winning yet more raves with Hamnet, will take the part of the Liverpudlian bassist, keyboardist, and singer-songwriter. The son of a midwife and jazz musician, he taught himself piano and guitar as a teenager, and was school friends with George Harrison. Aged 15, McCartney met John Lennon and his band, the Quarrymen, and came on board as a guitarist. Harrison joined them in 1958, and by 1960, they’d renamed themselves The Beatles.
McCartney began playing bass in 1961, and two years later, Beatlemania swept the world following the success of “Love Me Do”. Alongside Lennon, McCartney co-wrote many of the band’s early hits including “She Loves You”, “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” and “Can’t Buy Me Love.” Over time, he became the de facto leader of The Beatles. After they disbanded, he embarked on a solo career in the ’70s, formed the band Wings, and still continues to tour and make music today, at 83. In 2022, he played Glastonbury, becoming the festival’s oldest solo headliner.
Harris Dickinson as John Lennon
The London-born, twice BAFTA-nominated Babygirl breakout, who recently made his directorial debut with the ambitious Urchin, will transform into Lennon, arguably the band’s most famous member. Born in Liverpool to a sailor and a housewife who had a difficult marriage, his aunt was eventually granted custody of him, though he remained close to his mother. At 15, she bought him his first guitar, and he formed a band, the Quarrymen. Two years later, she died after being hit by a car aged 44, a loss which had a profound impact on the teenager.
Once the Quarrymen had morphed into The Beatles, he was their frontman, though he ceded the role to McCartney over time. In 1969, he married avant-garde artist Yoko Ono, for whom he’d left his first wife, Cynthia Powell. Together, he and Ono started the Plastic Ono Band and released “Give Peace a Chance,” which became an anti-Vietnam War anthem. Lennon quit The Beatles later that year, but agreed not to inform the media while his bandmates were still renegotiating their recording contract. He was outraged when McCartney then publicized his own departure and released his solo debut album in 1970.
Lennon’s first solo album was a success, too, as were singles “Imagine” and “Happy Xmas (War Is Over).” He and Ono moved to New York in 1971, after which the Nixon administration spent four years trying to deport him for his anti-war stance. Following a two-year separation, as a result of mental health struggles and infidelity, Lennon and Ono reunited and released 1980’s Double Fantasy. Three weeks later, Lennon was shot and killed by a gunman in New York, aged just 40. He is remembered as one of the most prolific musicians of all time.
Barry Keoghan as Ringo Starr
Keoghan, the Irish Oscar nominee and star of Saltburn and The Banshees of Inisherin, will become The Beatles’ drummer and sometime singer, born Richard Starkey. Growing up in Liverpool, the only child of divorced parents, he was chronically ill, and first started making music as part of a hospital band. He developed an interest in drumming, but worked on the railways, as a waiter, and in manufacturing before playing in various bands. As a member of the ’60s group The Hurricanes, he adopted the stage name Ringo Starr.
He first met The Beatles in 1960, when The Hurricanes were performing alongside them in Hamburg. Startlingly, the latter were given top billing and paid more. Starr played with The Beatles during a few engagements, and in 1962, accepted Lennon’s invite to join the band, replacing their recently fired drummer, Pete Best. Starr’s drumming solos became legendary, and he sang lead vocals, too, on the likes of “Yellow Submarine” and “With a Little Help From My Friends.” However, he felt sidelined during much of his time with The Beatles. After they broke up, his 1973 solo album, Ringo, was a hit. He’s still releasing music and touring, now aged 85.
Joseph Quinn as George Harrison
The Londoner you’ll know from The Fantastic Four: First Steps, Gladiator II, A Quiet Place: Day One, and Stranger Things completes the quartet as the band’s lead guitarist. The “quiet Beatle” was raised in Liverpool by a bus conductor and a shop assistant, the youngest of four. He learned the guitar aged 14, formed a band, and was school friends with McCartney. He first auditioned for the latter’s band with Lennon in 1958, but at 15, was deemed too young. Still, he hung out with them, filled in on guitar as needed and eventually became a member.
During his time in The Beatles, he wrote “Something” and “Here Comes the Sun,” and was inspired by Indian classical music and spirituality, incorporating traditional instrumentation into their work. When they disbanded, he released a triple album, All Things Must Pass, co-founded the Traveling Wilburys with Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan, and Tom Petty, and collaborated with Ravi Shankar. In 1999, he survived a devastating knife attack during a home invasion, but two years later the lifelong smoker succumbed to throat cancer, aged 58. His ashes were scattered in the Ganges and Yamuna rivers, in accordance with Hindu tradition, and his work in bringing together eastern and western musical styles continues to be remembered.
Saoirse Ronan as Linda Eastman
The Irish four-time Oscar nominee of Little Women, Lady Bird, and Brooklyn fame will play Linda Eastman, Paul McCartney’s first wife. A New Yorker and a year his senior, Eastman was a photographer who’d captured everyone from The Rolling Stones to Aretha Franklin. When she photographed Eric Clapton for Rolling Stone’s May 1968 issue, she became the first woman ever to have their shot on the cover. She’d met McCartney for the first time the year before, while on assignment in London, and eventually joined him in the British capital, with her daughter from a previous marriage in tow. The couple wed in 1969.
After The Beatles split, they formed the band Wings (with Linda as keyboardist), Linda released two vegetarian cookbooks, was an outspoken animal rights activist and had her photographs exhibited in over 50 galleries internationally. She and Paul had three more children, Mary, James, and Stella McCartney, over the course of their 29-year union, before she died from breast cancer in 1998, aged 56.
Anna Sawai as Yoko Ono
The New Zealand-born, Japan-raised star of Shōgun—who already has Emmy, SAG, and Golden Globe awards under her belt—takes the coveted part of Yoko Ono. The boundary-pushing Japanese artist, musician, and activist first met John Lennon in 1966, when he was still married to Cynthia Powell. They fell in love and Ono became pregnant, but later had a miscarriage. Following Lennon and Powell’s divorce, they married in 1969, recorded music together as the Plastic Ono Band, and used their honeymoon to stage a “bed-in” to protest the Vietnam War. They separated for a time in the ’70s, but then reconciled, and their son, Sean, was born in 1975. Since John’s death in 1980, she has worked to preserve his legacy and, for a time, continued to make art and music. Now, at 92, she has largely withdrawn from public life.
Aimee Lou Wood as Pattie Boyd
Sex Education and The White Lotus’s Emmy-nominated Aimee Lou Wood, who hails from Greater Manchester, is coming on board as Pattie Boyd, the Somerset-born model and photographer known for her irresistible swinging ’60s style. The British Vogue cover girl, beloved by David Bailey, Terence Donovan, and Ossie Clark, met George Harrison at 19, when she was cast as a schoolgirl in 1964’s A Hard Day’s Night. She soon moved in with the then-20-year-old, the couple married in 1966, and Boyd shared her husband’s interest in eastern mysticism, yoga, and vegetarianism. However, Harrison’s commitment to the Hare Krishna movement was beginning to strain their relationship by 1970.
In 1973, Boyd had an affair with Ronnie Wood, while Harrison did the same with Wood’s wife, and Harrison also later romanced Ringo Starr’s wife, Maureen Cox. After he and Boyd divorced in 1977, she married Eric Clapton in 1979, with that marriage ending after a decade, too. She served as the inspiration for a number of songs from both Harrison (“I Need You,” “Something,” and “For You Blue”) and Clapton (“Layla,” “Bell Bottom Blues,” and “Wonderful Tonight”) over this period. In 2007, Boyd published the best-selling autobiography Wonderful Today, and has exhibited her own photographs, taken in the ’60s of friends and fellow luminaries. She is now 81.
Mia McKenna-Bruce as Maureen Cox
How to Have Sex’s BAFTA-winning, Bexley-born Mia McKenna-Bruce will be Maureen Cox, the first wife of Ringo Starr. The Liverpudlian hairdresser met the Beatle when they were performing at the Cavern Club, and they married in 1965. They would have three children, Zak, Jason, and Lee, before divorcing a decade later, due to Ringo’s various infidelities as well as Maureen’s affair with George Harrison. She died of leukaemia in 1994, aged 48, after which Paul McCartney wrote “Little Willow” in her memory.
James Norton as Brian Epstein
The BAFTA-nominated Londoner and screen regular, recently seen in House of Guinness, will play another crucial role in the biopics: that of Liverpudlian Brian Epstein, The Beatles’ manager from 1961 until his death in 1967. He first met the band at Liverpool’s Cavern Club, when he was running his family’s music shop. Despite having no experience of managing artists, he put them under contract in 1962, and encouraged them to adopt a new clean-cut style. He got them a recording contract with EMI’s Parlophone label, and they were quickly catapulted to superstardom. A month after his father’s passing, Epstein was found dead, with a coroner ruling it as accidental, and caused by a combined alcohol and barbiturate overdose. He was just 32. The Beatles were devastated, and Epstein’s loss marked the beginning of the end for the band, which split in 1969.
David Morrissey as Jim McCartney
The Liverpool-born, TV BAFTA-nominated star of Sherwood is taking the part of Paul’s father. Despite working as a salesman, he was a trumpet player and pianist, and led a jazz band in the ’20s. His encouragement was formative for the young Paul.
Leanne Best as Mimi Smith
Another Liverpudlian, who you might recognize from Line of Duty or Ted Lasso, Best will play John Lennon’s aunt Mimi, who raised him after being granted custody by his mother. She was sceptical of her nephew’s musical aspirations, but supportive nonetheless.
Bobby Schofield as Neil Aspinall
The SAS: Rogue Heroes actor from Merseyside will be Aspinall, a school friend of Paul McCartney and George Harrison who was later The Beatles’ road manager and a trusted confidante, driving them between shows at all hours of the day and night. He was later promoted to personal assistant, and eventually became the chief executive of The Beatles’ company, Apple Corps.
Daniel Hoffmann-Gill as Mal Evans
Following Aspinall’s promotion, Evans was The Beatles’ main roadie, and will be played by Nottingham native Hoffmann-Gill—of Sherlock, Sherwood, and The Sandman. Formerly a bouncer at the Cavern Club, Brian Epstein hired Evans to assist the band, after which he became indispensable. Evans was present for all of The Beatles’ tours and nearly all of their recording sessions, and was occasionally an uncredited additional musician on their later albums. After the band broke up, he continued to work as a record producer on the musicians’ solo projects.
Arthur Darvill as Derek Taylor
The Doctor Who and Broadchurch actor from Birmingham, who’s won an Olivier for his stage work, is Taylor, The Beatles’ press officer. A journalist-turned-media liaison, he was renowned for his forward-thinking and extravagant promotional campaigns.
Adam Pally as Allen Klein
The New York-born comedian and actor from The Mindy Project will be the New Jersey businessman and controversial music manager, who began working with The Beatles after the death of Brian Epstein. Over the course of his turbulent career, his aggressive negotiation tactics maximised his clients’ profits, but made him a fortune, too.
Harry Lloyd as George Martin
The Londoner and TV BAFTA nominee from Doctor Who, Wolf Hall, and The Theory of Everything—who was also Game of Thrones’s Viserys Targaryen, brother to Daenerys—will be The Beatles’ long-time music producer. Martin was an arranger, composer, conductor, and musician who wrote most of the band’s orchestral and string arrangements, and even played the piano on a number of their records. His illustrious career resulted in 30 UK number one singles and six Grammys.
