JASON SCHWARTZMAN WAS only 18 when his career began. His very first movie was 1998's Rushmore, the second film from writer/director Wes Ande rson, and it finds Schwartzman in the lead role of the too-smart-for-his-own-good high schooler and self-styled playwright Max Fischer.

The Mountainhead' writer-director Jesse Armstrong talks about Elon Musk, Sam Bankman-Fried, and tackling tech titans in a dark time.

The speed of the production pretty well matched the public timeline, Armstrong said. He pitched the idea to HBO chief Casey Bloys in December 2024, then wrote the script in January. Most of the cast signed on before Armstrong finished the script, and the production time was short.