Adele, the Grammy- and Oscar-winning singer, is making her acting debut in "Cry to Heaven," the third feature film from fashion designer and director Tom Ford. The casting was announced in November 2025.

The story

The film adapts Anne Rice's 1982 novel, set in 18th-century Italy, about the intertwined lives of a Venetian nobleman and a castrato — a male opera singer castrated as a boy to preserve his high voice — amid ambition, art and betrayal. Adele's role has not been disclosed.

The cast

Ford, who wrote the screenplay and is directing, assembled a large ensemble: Nicholas Hoult, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, George MacKay, Mark Strong, Colin Firth, Paul Bettany, Thandiwe Newton, Hunter Schafer and Owen Cooper, the young breakout star of the Netflix series "Adolescence" (W Magazine; BroadwayWorld). Ford is reportedly financing the film himself.

Filming and release

Filming was scheduled to begin in January 2026 in London and Rome, with a release expected in late 2026. As of the latest reporting we found, no official release date had been announced.

Why it matters

Adele said in 2024 that she planned "a big break" from music after her Las Vegas residency ended, telling Germany's ZDF that she wanted "to do other creative things, just for a little while." Apart from a brief appearance on "Ugly Betty" in 2009, this is her first acting role; her best-known film credit is the Oscar-winning theme song for the James Bond film "Skyfall." Ford's previous films, "A Single Man" (2009) and "Nocturnal Animals" (2016), both earned Oscar nominations.

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