Deacon Phillippe Makes Film Debut in Brother Save Us
Deacon Phillippe will make his feature-film acting debut in “Brother Save Us,” which has its world premiere at the Nashville Film Festival on Sept. 26, Variety reported on Sept. 24.
Phillippe is the son of actors Reese Witherspoon and Ryan Phillippe. He graduated in May from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he studied recorded music at the Clive Davis Institute.
The film was written and directed by Jesse Behrenwald. It is set in a dystopian America and centres on a farmer fighting to save his family farm. He is also trying to protect his younger brother from a conglomerate that is replacing human workers with AI bots.
Thomas Murphy Molony plays the younger brother. The story puts the two siblings at the heart of the film, with the farm and family ties driving the plot.
Music is part of the debut as well. Phillippe co-wrote the end-credits song with two college friends and recorded it at NYU studios, drawing on his training in recorded music.
It is his first leading role in a feature, but not his first time on screen. He appeared in two episodes of “Never Have I Ever” in 2022. He later played the younger brother of his father’s character in flashback scenes in the Prime Video series “Motorheads.”
What makes this stand out is how closely the project links his two disciplines. He arrives as a trained musician taking on a full film role, with a song credit alongside the acting credit.
More screen work is already lined up. He will appear in “Better Than the Movies,” director Julie Hart’s Netflix adaptation of Lynn Painter’s novel about a high school student obsessed with romantic comedies. He was also cast in “4 Kids Walk Into a Bank,” a film led by Liam Neeson, according to Just Jared.
The Nashville premiere marks his formal introduction as a film actor. The festival screening on Sept. 26 is listed as the world premiere, meaning it is the first public showing of the finished film.
