Director Ira Sachs Defends Casting Straight Actors in 'The Man I Love' Alongside Rami Malek

'The Man I Love,' featuring Rami Malek and Tom Sturridge, garnered critical acclaim during its debut at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival last week. Now director Ira Sachs is addressing questions about his casting choices.

In a conversation with Variety, Sachs spoke candidly about bringing straight performers into gay roles for the project. "I don't ask people who they've slept with, and what I have found out is you never know," he explained.

The film, which also features Rebecca Hall and Ebon Moss-Bachrach, is billed as a "musical fantasia of a city under duress." Set in late 1980s New York during the AIDS crisis, it centers on Jimmy George, a Downtown performance artist navigating an extraordinary moment between great illness and death, where beauty and love remain possible.

Sachs elaborated on his approach to filmmaking, noting that he identifies as a gay man and primarily creates films centered on gay narratives. "Every time I make a movie, I'm overturning the idea of what is interesting to people because the dominant culture says our lives are not interesting. That's something I refuse to accept," he said.

When discussing his decision to cast Malek, Sachs pointed to the actor's work on Mr. Robot as a key factor. "In that series, he had this very natural, easy kind of acting in which I couldn't see the beginnings and ends of his sentences, and I was curious about it. He's also such a unique presence. Rami is a star, and he has something magnetic that allows him to hold a movie together," the director explained.