Todd Field, the Portland-Raised Director of “TÁR,” Is Teaming With Martin Scorsese for His Next Project

What’s Todd Field, the Portland-raised director of TÁR, doing next? For nearly a year, it was believed that he was either preparing a collaboration with Adam Sandler or was “highly likely” to retire after directing only three features.

Now, it appears that Field isn’t quite ready to put down the bullhorn: According to Martin Scorsese, he and Field may be adapting several novels by Marilynne Robinson, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Gilead (2004).

In an interview with Sight and Sound, Scorsese revealed that he and Field had already worked on a screenplay adaptation of Home, Robinson’s 2008 novel about two adult children returning to their childhood home in Iowa.

“It’s one of the four novels: Gilead, Home, Lila and Jack,” Scorsese said. “Todd Field and I started on Home, and did a version before the writers’ strike, with Kent Jones, a year ago.”

Scorsese went on to hint that Field might helm Gilead, which is a multigenerational saga of Congregationalist ministers. If Field steps up to direct, that would make Gilead his fourth film in a 20-year-plus career, following In the Bedroom (2001) and Little Children (2006).

Field’s Portland roots run deep. He was once a batboy for the Portland Mavericks, before going on to act alongside Tom Cruise in Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut and direct the acclaimed TÁR (our 2022 review in WW described the film as “epic-scale cinema” that “will leave you both troubled and awestruck.”