FILM · 2013 · USA
The Great Gatsby
- Directed by
- Baz Luhrmann
- Runtime
- 143 min
- Studio
- Warner Bros. Pictures, Village Roadshow Pictures, Bazmark
62 archived facts 6 topics 1 source Last reviewed Sep 2026
Nick Carraway arrives in New York in 1922, an era of loose morals, glittering jazz and bootleg kings. Chasing his own American Dream, Nick encounters the mysterious millionaire Gatsby and his bewitching cousin Daisy. Soon, Nick is drawn into the captivating world of the super-rich, their illusions, loves and deceits. Bearing witness to this new world, Nick pens a tale of impossible love, incorruptible dreams and…
Summary: TMDB
All facts (62)
- #001
Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire have been friends since childhood. The Great Gatsby marked the first time they appeared in a film together since Don's Plum (2001); before that, they had both appeared in This Boy's Life (1993).
- #002
On the first day of shooting, director Baz Luhrmann filmed the scene in which Jay Gatsby, Nick Carraway and Daisy Buchanan have tea during a rainstorm. Because it was a beautiful spring day, Luhrmann had to use 100,000 litres of water to create the downpour seen in the film. Immediately afterwards, it rained for three days.
- #003
Leonardo DiCaprio wanted to play Jay Gatsby because he was drawn to the idea of a man who starts from nothing and builds himself entirely out of his own imagination. Of the role, he said: "Gatsby is one of those iconic characters because he can be interpreted in so many ways: as a hopeless romantic, as a completely obsessive lunatic, or as a dangerous gangster clinging to wealth."
- #004
A photograph of author F. Scott Fitzgerald's wife, Zelda Fitzgerald, hangs on the wall of the apartment Tom Buchanan shares with Myrtle Wilson. Although Zelda's photograph appears in the film, the character Daisy Buchanan was primarily based on Ginevra King, Fitzgerald's first love, a wealthy Chicago socialite he could not marry because he had no money. Despite his later marriage to Zelda Sayre, which Fitzgerald described as a disappointment, he continued to pine for King as an unattainable ideal who embodied the elusive American Dream.
- #005
Both this film and an earlier adaptation, The Great Gatsby (1974), won the Academy Award for Best Costume Design.
- #006
F. Scott Fitzgerald based the character Jay Gatsby primarily and in part on his neighbour Max Gerlach. After serving as an officer in the United States Army during World War I, Gerlach became a gentleman bootlegger running liquor into New York City on behalf of Arnold Rothstein. Flaunting his new wealth, Gerlach hosted lavish parties, never wore the same shirt twice, used the phrase "old sport," which he claimed came from his education at Oxford University, and cultivated myths about himself, including that he was a relative of the German Kaiser.
- #007
Director Baz Luhrmann based the interior design of Jay Gatsby's Long Island mansion on the high school he attended in Australia.
- #008
Around 2010, Martin Scorsese was reported to be interested in directing a period adaptation of The Great Gatsby. However, when Baz Luhrmann pursued the project, Scorsese turned his attention to making The Wolf of Wall Street (2013). Leonardo DiCaprio starred in both projects.
- #009
F. Scott Fitzgerald created the character Daisy Buchanan primarily inspired by the socialite Ginevra King. Although Ginevra was "madly in love" with Fitzgerald, her father opposed their relationship and allegedly told Fitzgerald that "poor boys shouldn't think of marrying rich girls." Heartbroken, Fitzgerald said he joined the US Army. While serving, he received a letter from Ginevra informing him that her father had arranged her sudden marriage to the polo player William "Bill" Mitchell. According to friends, "Fitzgerald was so smitten by King that for years he could not think of her without tears coming to his eyes."
- #010
Most of the period-accurate cars came from Jay Leno's automobile collection.
- #011
Although the novel is set only in 1922, the film is set in 1922 and 1929. Earlier film adaptations of F. Scott Fitzgerald's book, such as The Great Gatsby (1926) and The Great Gatsby (1949), changed the setting to 1925 and 1928 respectively in order to add references to the Charleston and other fleeting Jazz Age fashions.
- #012
While at a fashion awards dinner, actress Carey Mulligan received a phone call from director Baz Luhrmann informing her that she had won the much-coveted role of Daisy Buchanan in the film. "I burst into tears in the middle of this room with Karl Lagerfeld and all these people standing next to me," she recalled. "They thought I was mental."
- #013
The film was not ready for its original release date of December 2012. After a meeting with Warner Bros. president Jeff Robinov, the date was pushed back. Robinov asked director Baz Luhrmann whether the film would be ready for Christmas. Luhrmann said yes. Robinov asked: "Will the movie you want to make be ready for Christmas?" Luhrmann replied no. Robinov gave Luhrmann a few more months to work on the film.
- #014
Several lines of dialogue and scenes reference F. Scott Fitzgerald's critical essays "My Lost City" and "Echoes of the Jazz Age."
- #015
George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" plays when Jay Gatsby first appears. Scholars suggest that the fictional piece of music played by the orchestra in F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel "Jazz History of the World," at the moment Nick first meets Gatsby, alludes to Gershwin's rhapsody. In a 1927 interview, Fitzgerald stated that "Rhapsody in Blue" idealized jazz in the same way that 1920s films such as Flaming Youth (1923) idealized the youthful spirit of the Jazz Age: "Flapper epics offer a dazzling vision of youth and joy and fast, paced feet. Youth… real youth… is essentially crude. But films idealize it, just as Gershwin idealizes jazz music. Rhapsody in Blue." Director Baz Luhrmann specifically chose "Rhapsody in Blue" to be Jay Gatsby's main motif.
- #016
The film's highly stylized designs reflected audiences' mistaken expectations of 1922 fashion. "When people say 'the Gatsby era,' they definitely think of a concept from the mid-'20s: shorter skirts and the truly archetypal flapper look," explained costume historian Alice Jurow of the Art Deco Society. "But 1922 was the Jazz Age in terms of music, though fashion hadn't quite caught up yet. Skirts were still mid-calf, even down to the ankles. Clothes were a little more elegant, ornate and flowing. People would be surprised, and I was bothered by whether anyone making The Great Gatsby was actually realizing 1922 fashion. It's just not how we picture those characters."
- #017
Although it was Elizabeth Debicki's first Hollywood role and her second feature film, it was shot in her own country, Australia. Her first trip to America was to be for director Baz Luhrmann's test film with Tobey Maguire.
- #018
When Klipspringer falls asleep on the organ, a pair of tennis shoes can be seen on the organ. In the novel, Klipspringer telephones Nick Carraway and asks whether anyone has seen the tennis shoes he left at the mansion.
- #019
Original Duesenberg automobiles are too rare and valuable to be used in action scenes. A Duesenberg Model SJ Cabrio Coupe sold at auction in March 2013, two months before the film's release, for more than $4.5 million. As a result, two replicas of the Duesenberg Model J were painted yellow and modified to match each other for filming.
- #020
Shortly before the film's release, it inspired wealthy celebrities to throw Gatsby-themed costume parties. Prince Harry attended a Gatsby-themed birthday party that cost $25,000, and Paul McCartney held his own lavish Gatsby-themed birthday gala. In London, publicists advised socialites on which of the many Gatsby parties to attend. In America, CNN offered a guide for affluent parents on throwing Gatsby-themed parties for their children. Ironically, F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel criticized exactly this kind of indulgent gala for the rich and privileged.
- #021
Contains a major spoiler — show
In the opening and closing scenes, which do not appear in the book, Nick Carraway is a patient at the Perkins Sanatorium. Max Perkins was F. Scott Fitzgerald's editor and close friend. In 1940 he was one of the few people to attend Fitzgerald's funeral.
- #022
At one of Gatsby's parties, Nick Carraway tries to take a glass of alcohol from a waiter's tray, but someone else takes the glass first. This is a reference to a similar scene in Spider-Man 2 (2004), in which Tobey Maguire repeatedly fails to take a glass of alcohol from various waiters' trays, always letting someone else take it first.
- #023
During production, a moving camera crane struck director Baz Luhrmann on the head. Luhrmann needed three stitches before production could resume.
- #024
During his relationship with his first love, Ginevra King, the writer F. Scott Fitzgerald sent her a Gatsby-like story. In his story, she is trapped in a loveless marriage to a wealthy man but longs for her former sweetheart Fitzgerald from her past. The lovers are reunited only when Fitzgerald has enough money to take her from her unfaithful husband. Fitzgerald kept Ginevra's story with him until his death, and scholars have pointed to the plot similarities between Ginevra's story and Fitzgerald's novel.
- #025
In the novel, Meyer Wolfsheim wore cufflinks made from human molars. F. Scott Fitzgerald based the character of Wolfsheim on the real-life gambler and bootlegger Arnold Rothstein, whom the author met during the Jazz Age, most likely in a conversation run by Max Gerlach. Rothstein became a millionaire at 30 and was murdered in 1928.
- #026
Doctor T. J. Eckleburg's billboard in the Valley of Ashes resembles artist Francis Cugat's cover for the first edition of the 1925 novel. The writer F. Scott Fitzgerald was so struck by Cugat's cover drafts that he told his editor Max Perkins he had incorporated Cugat's images into the novel. After a brief career as a cover designer in New York City, Cugat moved to Hollywood in the mid-1920s and became set designer for the actor Douglas Fairbanks.
- #027
Ben Affleck was initially cast as Tom Buchanan but was dropped from the cast because of a scheduling conflict with Argo (2012). After Affleck's departure, Bradley Cooper and Luke Evans were considered, and Joel Edgerton was ultimately cast.
- #028
This is the Indian actor Amitabh Bachchan's first appearance in a Hollywood film.
- #029
The phrase "old sport" is spoken 55 times over the course of the film; all but four of those instances are delivered by Leonardo DiCaprio (including two examples repeated in flashbacks near the end of the film). Of the four not spoken by DiCaprio, two are by Joel Edgerton, one by Steve Bisley and one by Callan McAuliffe.
- #030
The $350,000 pearl necklace Tom gave Daisy in 1918 would have been worth about $5.4 million in 2013, the year the film was released.
- #031
The exterior of Gatsby's Long Island residence was based on the Beacon Towers mansion, built by Alva Vanderbilt and later owned by William Randolph Hearst's estranged wife Millicent Hearst. While writing the novel, Fitzgerald based his conception of Gatsby's mansion on Beacon Towers, located in Sands Point, New York, the real-life equivalent of the novel's "West Egg." Beacon Towers was demolished in 1945.
- #032
Amanda Seyfried, Rebecca Hall, Rachel McAdams, Keira Knightley, Blake Lively, Abbie Cornish, Michelle Williams, Natalie Portman, Eva Green, Anne Hathaway, Olivia Wilde, Jessica Alba and Scarlett Johansson were all considered to play Daisy Buchanan.
- #033
Leonardo DiCaprio became the fourth actor to play Jay Gatsby in a major theatrical film released in cinemas. Warner Baxter played the character in The Great Gatsby (1926), Alan Ladd in The Great Gatsby (1949) and Robert Redford in The Great Gatsby (1974). The role was also played in television adaptations by Robert Montgomery in The Great Gatsby (1955), Robert Ryan in The Great Gatsby (1958) and Toby Stephens in The Great Gatsby (2000).
- #034
There are several references to Arrow Collars. Arrow brand detachable shirt collars were common men's clothing accessories in the early 1920s, and the Arrow Collar Man featured in a highly successful and popular advertising campaign.
- #035
In the 1920s, contemporary names for the era were "The Jazz Age" and "The Plastic Age." Hollywood screenwriters used both names as film titles: The Jazz Age (1929) and The Plastic Age (1925). The writer F. Scott Fitzgerald is known for popularizing "the Jazz Age" as a label for the period with the publication of his anthology "Tales of the Jazz Age." "The Roaring Twenties" did not become popular until after the Great Depression, with the premiere of The Roaring Twenties (1939).
- #036
Jay-Z served as an executive producer on this film. He reportedly convinced director Baz Luhrmann to use hip-hop music made up of his own songs.
- #037
Joel Edgerton and Jason Clarke have been friends for a long time and were roommates in their early days struggling as actors in the United States. They had previously appeared together in Zero Dark Thirty (2012).
- #038
The waiter who, after lunch with Gatsby, brings Nick to Jordan's table for tea.
- #039
An alternate ending featured Ralph Cotterill as Henry C. Gatz, Jay Gatsby's father.
- #040
With this film's premiere, 39-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio became the oldest actor to play Jay Gatsby in a major motion picture. Warner Baxter was 37 when he appeared in The Great Gatsby (1926), Alan Ladd was 36 when he played Gatsby in The Great Gatsby (1949), and Robert Redford was 38 when he played Gatsby in The Great Gatsby (1974).
- #041
It was sent to theaters under the title "North Shore Romance," a reference to the novel's setting on Long Island's North Shore.
- #042
In an early scene, Tom Buchanan jokes about the remote possibility of marriage between white and black people. Joel Edgerton later played Richard Loving in Loving (2016), a film about the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down all state laws banning interracial marriage.
- #043
It was the 17th highest-grossing film of the year it was released. The film finished its opening weekend in 2nd place behind Iron Man 3 (2013). At the time, it had the 6th biggest opening weekend for a film not in 1st place, the 2nd biggest opening weekend for a film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, and became director Baz Luhrmann's highest-grossing film.
- #044
The crystal goblets and champagne flutes Gatsby uses at his private party at his house for Daisy are Waterford Colleen Encore Crystal, produced from 2005 to 2018.
- #045
Leonardo DiCaprio and Joel Edgerton were both born in 1974, the same year The Great Gatsby (1974) was released.
- #046
Dan Cody's yacht is the Hurrica-V, a 1924 three-masted 60' ketch designed by Charles E. Nicholson and built in Sydney by W. M. Ford.
- #047
When this film opened the 66th Cannes Film Festival on May 15, 2013, Robert Redford was appearing in All Is Lost (2013) and Bruce Dern in Nebraska (2013). The two men had previously appeared together in The Great Gatsby (1974).
- #048
Baz Luhrmann and Craig Pearce's screenplay made five notable changes to the novel's plot: Nick Carraway writes in a sanatorium some time after the summer, having himself under control; he flirts with Jordan Baker but, unlike in the novel, is "too smitten with Gatsby to notice her;" Gatsby himself makes a spectacular entrance, whereas in the novel some time passes while they talk before Carraway understands who he is; some of the racism or antisemitism was softened or removed; and in the end Gatsby dies believing that pursuing Daisy succeeded.
- #049
Joel Edgerton and Jack Thompson had previously appeared together in Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002).
- #050
The original premiere date was December 2012, then it was moved to July 2013, and finally it was rescheduled for May 2013.
- #051
Tobey Maguire and Carey Mulligan had worked together four years earlier on Brothers (2009).
- #052
Filming took place in Australia, chiefly Sydney, with a net production budget of $105 million. The desolate land between West Egg and New York, the "Valley of Ashes," was shot in Balmain, New South Wales. Manly Business School, located in Manly, New South Wales and known as St Patrick's Seminary, doubled as Gatsby's mansion. To stay faithful to the Long Island setting, palm trees had to be digitally removed in post-production. Nick's house was in Centennial Park. Daisy's house was Gowan Brae, a historic mansion at The King's School in Parramatta.
- #053
A film that polarized critics, The Great Gatsby (2013) drew both praise and criticism for its visual style, direction, performances, music and interpretation of the source material. Audiences reacted more favorably, and F. Scott Fitzgerald's granddaughter praised the film, saying, "Scott would have been proud."
- #054
Indian actor Amitabh Bachchan plays the Ashkenazi Jewish gangster Meyer Wolfsheim.
- #055
It was Lara Goldie's first film.
- #056
Carey Mulligan won the role shortly after Baz Luhrmann showed audition footage to Sony Pictures Entertainment executives Amy Pascal and Doug Belgrad, who were impressed by the actress's command of the character. Luhrmann said: "I had the privilege of exploring the character with some of the most talented actresses in the world; each brought her own particular interpretation, all of which were legitimate and exciting. But specifically for this particular production of The Great Gatsby (2013), I was very excited when I got on the phone an hour ago with young Oscar-nominated British actress Carey Mulligan and said to her, 'Hello Daisy Buchanan.'".
- #057
Australian newcomer Elizabeth Debicki won the role of Jordan Baker. Casting the supporting role of Jordan, Baz Luhrmann said the character needed to be "as thoroughly examined as Daisy, for this production, for this time," adding: "It's like Laurence Olivier's Hamlet (1948) was the right Hamlet for his time. Who would Hamlet be today? Same with Jordan or Daisy."
- #058
The Great Gatsby (2013) is a historical romantic drama film adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel. Directed and co-written by Baz Luhrmann, it stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire, Carey Mulligan, Joel Edgerton, Isla Fisher, Jason Clarke and Elizabeth Debicki. The film follows the life and times of millionaire Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his neighbour Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire) amid the riotous parties of the Jazz Age on Long Island, New York. Luhrmann said he intended the film to feel more contemporary because of its theme of criticising the often irresponsible lifestyles of the wealthy.
- #059
As of 2023, The Great Gatsby (2013) is Baz Luhrmann's highest-grossing film, with over $353 million worldwide. The film won in both categories for which it was nominated at the 86th Academy Awards: Best Production Design (production designer Catherine Martin and set decorator Beverley Dunn) and Best Costume Design (Martin).
- #060
Principal photography began on 1 September 2011 and ended on 4 January 2012, spanning a total of 125 calendar days.
- #061
The Great Gatsby (2013) is the second collaboration between Baz Luhrmann and Leonardo DiCaprio; DiCaprio had appeared in Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet (1996).
- #062
Of the seven main characters, all explicitly written as Americans — Tom, Daisy, Nick, Jordan, Myrtle, George and of course Gatsby himself — only two are actually played by an American.
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