Al Pacino to Play Henri Matisse in ‘Masterpiece’

Hollywood veteran Al Pacino is set to play the lead role in Masterpiece, a film by Deepa Mehta about famous Fauvist Henry Matisse. The story is based on true life episodes in Matisse's life and will follow the artist's relationship with his model Monique Bourgeois who was also the painter's nurse, and muse. Bourgeois was hired by Matisse in 1941, when the painter was in his 70s. He featured her in several of his canvases before the WW2 forced them apart. She became a Dominican nun known as Sister Jaques-Marie , and the pair re-meet face to face in Vence, France, where she inspired him to paint the Chapelle du Rosaire, often known as the Matisse chapel and one of the most significant works of art of the 20th century. Sister Jacques-Marie, died in 2005. She insisted her relationship with the painter had always been free from sensual desire:

I never really noticed whether he was in love with me. I was a little like his granddaughter or his muse, but he was always a perfect gentleman.”

Deepa Mehta, Indian-born Canadian film director and screenwriter, earned an Oscar nomination in 2006 for Water, while Al Pacino won an Academy Award for his turn in 1992's Scent of a Woman. Pacino will next be seen on screen in Son of No One, which debuted at Sundance last month. The film is based on a script by Donald Martin. No date has been set to start filming but producers are set to begin the process of casting two female leads. It will be great to see one of the best actors in all of film history, most famed for playing gangsters and detectives, portraying the renowned French artist in upcoming ‘Masterpiece', directed by a sophisticated Mehta.

Henri Matisse