Sundance 2023 includes Michael J. Fox doc and ‘Cat Person’ drama

What’s the next “CODA”?

That’s the big question for the Sundance Film Festival, which announced its 2023 lineup of 99 movies on Wednesday.

Director Sian Heder’s heartwarming indie about a hearing girl with deaf parents and a deaf brother won the Academy Award for Best Picture back in March — a first for the 44-year-old festival in Park City, Utah. Apple was smart to snap up the movie in 2021 for a cool $25 million.

The glam mountain gathering will return to in-person premieres for the first time since January 2020; however, it will keep its popular streaming platform in place. During the festival’s second week, many of the films will be available to watch online from anywhere in the US.

January’s slate is short on big-name directors and major anticipated projects. But, at Sundance, it’s the discovery of new gems, like “CODA,” that gets everybody talking.

One sure sizzler is “Cat Person” in the Premieres program. Based on the viral 2017 New Yorker story about the perils of modern-day dating, director Susanna Fogel’s film will star Emilia Jones of “CODA” and Nicholas Braun from “Succession.”

Other eye-catching premieres include director William Oldroyd’s “Eileen,” which stars Anne Hathaway and is set in a Massachusetts prison; Sophie Barthes’ “The Pod Generation,” a sci-fi rom-com with Emilia Clarke and Chiwetel Ejiofor; and Nicole Holofcener’s “You Hurt My Feelings” starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Tobias Menzies. 

Over in the US Dramatic Competition category, Ben Platt and Noah Galvin lead “Theater Camp,” a comedy about a summer getaway that’s fallen on hard times, and “Magazine Dreams,” starring Jonathan Majors as an amateur bodybuilder, which rings of the very good past Sundance drama “Jockey.”

The Festival has debuted some tremendous documentaries in recent years, such as “Boys State” and “Three Identical Strangers.” Expect “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie,” a deep dive into the life of the “Back To the Future” actor, to be a talker. Same goes for “Little Richard: I Am Everything” about the singer who died in 2020.

The Sundance Film Festival runs Jan. 19-29, 2023, in Park City, Utah.