Searchlight Pictures

Searchlight Pictures shares the official trailer for 'The Roses' starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman

By Sophia Soto | Last updated Apr 17, 2025 9:58 AM ET

Searchlight Pictures just dropped the trailer for Jay Roach's The Roses, proving that all’s fair when love is war. The film is a reimagining of 1989's The War of the Roses and is based on the novel by Warren Adler.

Along with Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman, who are both executive producers, the cast includes Andy Samberg, Allison Janney, Belinda Bromilow, Sunita Mani, Ncuti Gatwa, Jamie Demetriou, Zoë Chao, and Kate McKinnon

Life seems easy for picture-perfect couple Ivy (Olivia Colman) and Theo (Benedict Cumberbatch): successful careers, a loving marriage, great kids. But beneath the façade of their supposed ideal life, a storm is brewing – as Theo’s career nosedives while Ivy’s own ambitions take off, a tinderbox of fierce competition and hidden resentment ignites.

In a first look interview with Vanity Fair, Colman, who plays Ivy, explained that while both lead actors were fans of The War of the Roses, this is not a remake: "All art influences other art. It’s very hard to find any story that hasn’t had beginnings in another story a year before or a thousand years before. And that’s part of the fun. Everything influences everything else."

"The film is a parable of two people who loved each other intensely, then ended up hating each other intensely and missing the middle ground," Cumberbatch, who portrays Theo, expressed. "Much of it is shockingly recognizable: how we struggle to show love toward the people we love the most, and how this can all go wrong very quickly if we're not careful about nurturing and nourishing the relationships at the center of our families."

Colman added, "I love that you can see the journey of two people who adore each other and slowly, slowly, bit by bit start to try and tear each other apart."

Along with praising Colman for being "as good on the first take as she would be on the 40th," Cumberbatch said, "I was working with such a fine company of comedy masters, so watching them improvise inspired me to do a little bit of my own as well. The supportive nature of this group was incredible."

The Roses will be released in theaters on August 29.

Sophia Soto

Sophia Soto is a writer and interviewer with a passion for all things entertainment. She is a Senior Reporter at The Nerds of Color and contributes to Yardbarker, Screensphere, Den of Geek, What to Watch, Nerdtropolis, and Temple of Geek. You can see her past work on Remezcla, Young Hollywood, Looper, Paste Magazine, Primetimer, Soundsphere, and Starry Constellation Magazine

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