Late Fame – ALLIANCE OF WOMEN FILM JOURNALISTS

LATE FAME – Review by Valerie Kalfrin

September 3, 2026September 3, 2026 Valerie Kalfrin Edmund Donovan, Greta Lee, Kent Jones, Late Fame, willem dafoe

Late Fame is not so much about a frustrated artist but about someone who, having enjoyed fame once, wonders later in life if he really wants such attention again.

Directed by Kent Jones (Diane), this lived-in New York story stars an understated Willem Dafoe (The Phoenician Scheme) as Ed Saxberger, a bohemian poet of the 1970s now sorting mail as a postal worker. Saxberger lives alone in a modest apartment of bookshelves and cassette tapes of poetry, but mostly, he’s content to shoot pool and joke around with other guys at a neighborhood bar where the female barkeep without asking sets out his favorite sandwich.

Festivals Reviews

LATE FAME (NYFF 2025) – Review by Diane Carson

September 23, 2025September 24, 2025 Diane Carson Edmund Donovan, Greta Lee, Kent Jones, Late Fame, willem dafoe

A thoughtful consideration of, as the title signals, Late Fame post office mail sorter Ed Saxberger wrote an ignored, small book of poetry, Way Past Go, years ago. Prompted by its dominant member Meyers, an arrogant, pretentious group calling itself the Enthusiasm Society discover Saxberger’s poetry and become fawning fans, though it becomes obvious several have not bothered to read the book. Approached out of the blue, flattered, Ed is eventually persuaded to attend the group’s meeting, drinking, and self-congratulatory get togethers. As Saxberger, Willem Dafoe transitions flawlessly from cautious and suspicious—at first thinking the attention is a prank—to enjoying the adulation, until he doesn’t.