Nomadland : The True Story Behind the Hulu Movie
On 2/19/21 at 7:30 AM EST
Nomadland has spent the last few months racking up awards, with the central performance of Frances McDormand as a woman who goes out on the road after her husband died. Apart from McDormand, however, nearly everyone in the film (which is streaming now on Hulu) is a real person, playing a fictionalized version of themselves.
This is one of the many layers of true stories that combine to make the fictional
Nomadland. As well as featuring people playing themselves, the film is also based on a non-fiction book by author Jessica Bruder, which depicts a group of mostly older people who have taken to the road to take up seasonal jobs following the Great Recession of the late 2000s.
Chloé Zhao’s take on Marvel’s Eternals was delayed by a full year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but her new film Nomadland made it to festivals and theaters in 2020, and it dominated year-end best-of lists and critics’ awards. Based on Jessica Bruder’s 2017 nonfiction book Nomadland, the drama stars Frances McDormand as a nomad named Fern, living out of a van as she moves from job to job. Nomadland is now streaming on Hulu.