For years, rumours stirred that we would one day get a sequel to Call Me By Your Name: Luca Guadagnino’s gay catnip movie that catapulted our king Timothée Chalamet to fame and catalysed close to half-a-decade of queer appropriation and age-gap discourse, all the while remaining an unbothered masterpiece. Nonetheless, the movie became a cult classic for twinks with a Letterboxd account who cry to Lana Del Rey, and the prospect of a sequel became their second coming.
Those rumours were, however, seemingly shut down last summer by the creator himself but — good news for annoying people everywhere! — Luca has now shared that he would still technically love to create a sequel to the queer favourite movie!
In an interview with Variety about his latest movie with Timmy, Bones And All, the director stated: “I would love to make a second and third and fourth chapter of all my movies. Why? Because I truly love the actors I work with, so I want to repeat the joy of doing what we did together,” he shared. “However, when it comes to Call Me By Your Name, there is no hypothesis, so there is no movie. It’s a wish and a desire.”
So that’s not a no! With this new sliver of hope that there may still be a possibility for a follow up, here’s everything we know from previous interviews with Luca and the cast about this potential Call Me By Your Name sequel.
What would a sequel to Call Me By Your Name be about?
The director has specifically said he wouldn’t call a follow up to CMBYN a sequel himself. “A sequel is an American concept,” Luca said in a recent interview at the Telluride Film Festival. “It’s more like the chronicles of Elio, the chronicles of this young boy becoming a man. It is something I want to do.” Us too.
In the new Variety interview he also shared he had “not made up [his] mind about what would be the story” but did suggest a potential alternative plot that follows Mafalda, Elio’s family’s housekeeper, played by Vanda Capriolo. “I would be very interested in seeing what is the life of Mafalda when she’s not around the family,” he said.
Has any production begun?
While it was widely believed that the follow up was in early stages of development at the start of 2021, it appears things have changed. At that time, Luca was working with Timmy and CMBYN co-star Michael Stuhlbarg on cannibal movie Bones And All, and had approached a new screenwriter to work on the script after James Ivory, who won an Oscar for his adaptation of the André Aciman book, dropped out. Things seemed to be in some form of motion, with the original leads (yes, Armie Hammer included) on board. But then the tides changed.
“The truth of the matter is, my heart is still there, but I’m working on this movie now,” Luca told Deadline in 2021, “and I’m hopefully going to do Scarface soon, and I have many projects and so will focus on this side of the Atlantic and the movies I want to make.” Well, Bones And All had its world premiere in September (read our review here) and the director’s next movie — Challengers starring Zendaya — has now completed filming. So maybe the director finally has some free time to dedicate to this?
Would Armie Hammer still be involved?
Considering the current state of Armie Hammer’s career — after a series of allegations about his off-screen behaviour came to light and led to him being dropped by his agent and publicist — it seems unlikely he’s top of any casting directors’ lists, but Luca hasn’t ruled it out. When asked by Variety if the film could still include Hammer’s character, he simply replied, “Yeah, of course.” Whether that would involve a recasting or not is unclear.
So if it does happen, when can we expect this to come out?
Honestly, if it does materialise, its release date will not be anytime soon. But we now know there’s still hope for a Call Me By Your Name sequel (or chronicle) and you have an excuse to watch the unparalleled original once again, knowing you might see a slightly older Timmy crying into a fireplace or having sex with a peach at some point in the foreseeable future. It’s a wish and a desire, after all!