‘Carmen,’ a Carmen Miranda Bio From Esmir Filho, to Shoot Next Year in U.S. and Brazil (EXCLUSIVE)

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — “Carmen,” the Portuguese and English-language biopic of iconic Hollywood’s Golden Age Brazilian star Carmen Miranda, will shoot in the second half of 2027 in Brazil and the U.S.

Esmir Filho will helm the feature, a major production for local standards, with a 61 million reais ($20 million) budget, one of the largest ever in Brazilian cinema. Producers have raised 80% of the budget through Brazilian incentives, producer Tatiana Issa told Variety.

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H2O Films plans to release “Carmen” in Brazilian theaters in the second half of 2028. Giovanna Lancellotti will play the leading role of Carmen Miranda and also serve as one of the pic’s producers.

Set to be unveiled on Oct. 7 at RioMarket, the business section of the Rio Film Festival, “Carmen” is based on a screenplay by Mariana Bardan and Eduardo Melo and produced by Julio Uchôa’s Ananã Produções, New York City-based Producing Partners (run by Issa and Guto Barra), Lancellotti’s GL Filmes and H2O.

In addition to Brazil, the producers aim to release the biopic theatrically in the U.S., Europe and Asia, where Miranda remains an icon, Issa said.

Miranda emerged as one of Brazil’s biggest radio, recording and film stars in the 1930s. Her U.S. career began in 1940 on Broadway, where she starred in musicals. Her distinctive costumes, turbans, platform shoes and rapid-fire singing style became instantly recognizable trademarks and opened the doors to Hollywood. She starred in 14 features until her death from a heart attack in 1955.

“Carmen became the highest-paid actress in the U.S. She would go into the office of Darryl F. Zanuck, the powerful head of production at Twentieth Century-Fox, and personally negotiate her contracts,” Issa said.

“She brought samba to the U.S. and turned it into something pop. Carmen was responsible for creating Brazil’s soft power at a time when the term did not even exist. Before Pelé and Brazil won soccer World Cups, she was the one who helped shape the international image of Brazilians as a joyful and colorful people,” she added.

Issa stressed Filho’s credentials to helm “Carmen” following his direction of “Homem com H,” the 2025 bio of Brazilian singer Ney Matogrosso, which was acclaimed by critics and achieved a solid box office performance.

Lancellotti, who has starred in local telenovelas and films, spent the past years preparing herself for the role of Miranda. She took singing lessons with musical performance director and vocal coach Felipe Habib and body preparation and choreography classes with Márcia Rubin and Vanessa Garcia.

“I immersed myself in Carmen Miranda’s story starting in 2021. I memorized the songs and began humming them every day,” she told Variety. “Carmen created an identity that, 70 years after her death, is still present in music, the arts and fashion.”

In addition to Brazilian actors, the pic’s cast will include English-speaking actors to play the roles of Zanuck, Broadway producer Lee Shubert and David Sebastian, Miranda’s only husband.

The film will shoot on location in New York City (for sequences chronicling her arrival by ship and her Broadway musicals), the Brazilian city of Maricá (standing in for Los Angeles) and Rio. The municipality of oil-rich Maricá, located about 35 miles away from Rio, is one of the production’s investors. According to Issa, the L.A. home scenario will eventually house the Carmen Miranda museum in Maricá.