Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City

In 1955, students and parents from across the country gather for scholarly competition, rest, recreation, comedy, drama, and romance at a Junior Stargazer convention held in a fictional American desert town.

Asteroid City is an upcoming American science fiction romantic comedy drama film written, directed and co-produced by Wes Anderson, based on a story by Anderson and Roman Coppola. The film follows the transformative events that occur at an annual Junior Stargazer convention in 1955. It features an ensemble cast that has been described as being "larger than most other Anderson films that are ensemble in nature."

Asteroid City will premiere at the 76th Cannes Film Festival in May 2023. It is set to be released by Focus Features in the United States in limited release on June 16, 2023, before expanding wide on June 23, 2023.

In September 2020, it was revealed Wes Anderson would be writing and directing a romance film, which he would produce alongside Jeremy Dawson and Steven Rales for American Empirical Pictures and Indian Paintbrush. By February 2021, Michael Cera and Jeff Goldblum entered negotiations to star in the director's next film, which was now described as being about a "group of brainy teenagers." Tilda Swinton was the first person to officially join the cast, doing so in June 2021.

Principal photography, originally set for Rome, took place in Spain between August and October 2021. Several sets in Chinchón, resembling a desert landscape and a mock train station, were used for the shoot. Cast member Fisher Stevens said the film would include "the wildest cast since The Bridge on the River Kwai" and that the cast and crew "were all bubbled together in a hotel, which was an old monastery."

The film's title was revealed by Bill Murray to be Asteroid City at the BFI London Film Festival in October 2021. Alexandre Desplat composed the film's score in his sixth collaboration with Anderson. In July 2022, it was announced that Focus Features would distribute the film, reuniting them with Anderson after Moonrise Kingdom (2012). It was also revealed Murray would not be in the film as initially reported as a result of contracting COVID-19 before he could shoot his scenes.

Costume design was by multiple Oscar-laureate Milena Canonero.

Asteroid City will premiere at the 76th Cannes Film Festival in May 2023. It is scheduled for a limited release in the United States on June 16, 2023, before expanding to a wide release on June 23, 2023.

For the United States release, an initial cut of the film received an R rating from the Motion Picture Association (MPA) for "brief graphic nudity". Focus Features is currently trying to appeal the rating.