Sydney Sweeney seems to have a particular penchant for biopics: Her film chronicling the life of boxing champion Christy Martin was announced last year, and we’ve already seen the actor in various stages of intense training for the role. Then, in October, another exciting project profiling a life just as fascinating was revealed—a biopic based on actress Kim Novak and directed by Colman Domingo.
Titled Scandalous, the film will focus on the classic American screen star’s romance with ’50s singer and Rat Pack legend Sammy Davis Jr (to be played by Industry actor David Jonsson) and will mark Met Gala 2025 co-chair Domingo’s directorial debut.
Giving us a preview of her role and the glamorous, era-appropriate fashions the film will exult, Sydney Sweeney appeared at the Met Gala 2025 in a shimmering black Miu Miu gown that paid homage to Novak. The dress, which features an elegant circular neckline and brooch detail, is a direct reference to what Novak wore in Robert Aldrich’s 1967 film The Demon of Women (with Novak s look in turn a reflection of the sparkly dress and brooch look that Joan Crawford had worn in the 1937 film The Bride Wore Red.
According to Variety, Domingo hopes to shoot his new project this year, after Sweeney’s completion of Euphoria season 3.
Kim Novak and Sammy Davis Jr. met in 1956 on the popular American talk show hosted by Steve Allen, and a year later Davis went to the set of Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo—where Novak was shooting—to get closer to her. They hit it off, despite the growing racist scrutiny and scorn for their inter-racial relationship. Novak’s producer was one particular adversary, trying his best to keep her away from Davis. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter in 2021, Novak shared: “Harry Cohn said, ‘You’re not to see this person again. When someone says something that definitely, it makes me want to do exactly what they don’t want me to do.” And though she insisted their relationship was never romantic, it exploded in the media when a columnist published a piece in 1958 claiming they were to be married. (Both Novak and Davis went on to other marriages and divorces. Today, Novak is 91, while Davis died in 1990 at age 64.)
Eyes peeled, then, for the story of Scandalous told through Domingo and Sweeney’s eyes.
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