The BFI London Film Festival closes on 18 October 2026 with the UK premiere of Jesse Eisenberg's The Debut at the Royal Festival Hall, with Julianne Moore and Paul Giamatti in the cast.
Jesse Eisenberg was born in New York in 1983 and acted for fifteen years before he directed anything, in The Squid and the Whale, Adventureland, Zombieland and above all as Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network, which brought an Academy Award nomination in 2010. He worked twice with Woody Allen, voiced two animated films and led the miniseries Fleishman Is in Trouble, then made his directorial debut in 2022 with When You Finish Saving the World. A Real Pain, which he wrote, directed and starred in, won him a BAFTA in 2024, and the second career has now overtaken the first.
The Debut is a comedy about a shy woman cast in a local production of an original musical who disappears into the part under a forceful director. Eisenberg leads an ensemble that includes Julianne Moore, Paul Giamatti, Halle Bailey and Bernadette Peters, and members of the cast are expected on the night. It is the third film he has directed in four years, and the first he has made with a cast of this weight.
The UK premiere is at the Royal Festival Hall on Sunday 18 October 2026 at 7.15pm, closing the seventieth BFI London Film Festival. There are same-night repeats at BFI Southbank and the Prince Charles Cinema, so the film plays three London houses in one evening.