Marc by Sofia, a tale of friendship Sofia Coppola presents her documentary on designer Marc Jacobs out of competition at Venice82

At the 2004 Oscars night, Sofia Coppola goes on stage to receive the award for Best Original Screenplay for Lost in Translation. A purple satin slip dress, a Louis Vuitton gown specially designed by her friend and creative director Marc Jacobs. The two had known each other for over ten years and had developed a deep, sincere bond based on both emotional and, essentially, elective affinities. It was the same worldview that brought the two creatives together, just at the moment when one of them wasn’t understood by the world he belonged to. It was 1992, and Jacobs presented the grunge style during the collection he designed for Perry Ellis. Flannel shirts, oversized silhouettes, band t-shirts among which, above all, Nirvana stood out. A style so sharp and precise that it became a staple for the boys and girls of the '90s, but it also led to the designer’s dismissal for dressing Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss in plaid skirts and outfits three sizes too big. That same evening, however, across the street, Sofia Coppola was busy staging a guerrilla show with Kim Gordon and Daisy von Furth for the launch of X-Girl, a brand that embodied the subversion of the establishment from a female perspective and resonated perfectly with the grunge flag waved by Jacobs. An event featuring faces like Chloë Sevigny, a young icon of the '90s, whose presence on the runway even turned into a music video shot on the streets of New York for the band Sonic Youth and their song Sugar Kane.

As often happens in these cases, it feels as if everything had already been written. Over time, Coppola and Jacobs solidified a relationship that quickly turned into a friendship—one that continued throughout their thirty-year-long careers and lives, bringing them together professionally on multiple occasions. The most recent will be at the 2025 Venice Film Festival, where the director and screenwriter will present out of competition Marc by Sofia, not only a portrait of the designer but also the first documentary by the author of Somewhere and The Virgin Suicides. A work that doesn’t just aim to focus on the artist’s years of work, but rather a full-circle story about him as a person and their friendship. Unlike Coppola, who is venturing into documentary filmmaking for the first time, this is not Marc Jacobs’ first documentary as a protagonist. He had already been filmed in 2007 for Marc Jacobs & Louis Vuitton by Loïc Prigent. This time, however, we can expect a more intimate portrait of the public figure, rooted in the trust between the two personalities—which is also reflected in the title. The film, in fact, uses their first names, not their surnames which, as we know, are trademarks. This is Marc by Sofia. Marc and Sofia, simply.

Although their bond grew away from the spotlight, shaped by shared tastes, aesthetics, and interests, it was inevitable that Coppola and Jacobs would eventually collaborate. The first time was in 2004, the same year as the director’s Oscar win and dress. A year marked by a photo taken by Juergen Teller showing the two embracing in bed, used as an ad campaign to promote the designer’s first fragrance (also simply named Marc). More collaborations followed. They ranged from a line of bags co-designed during Jacobs’ tenure at Louis Vuitton, to the teenage brand Heaven by Marc Jacobs, from the director posing as his model in the Spring/Summer 2015 campaign alongside Cher and Winona Ryder, to the commercial for the Daisy perfume. A partnership that now brings the duo together at the Lido, with the documentary’s premiere and the simultaneous release of a book of the same name published by the production and distribution company A24.