Behind any great man, there's always a greater woman - and you're about to meet her. Joan Castleman (Glenn Close): a highly intelligent and still-striking beauty - the perfect devoted wife. Forty years spent sacrificing her own talent, dreams and ambitions to fan the flames of her charismatic husband Joe (Jonathan Pryce) and his skyrocketing literary career. Ignoring his infidelities and excuses because of his "art" with grace and humour. Their fateful pact has built a marriage upon uneven compromises. And Joan's reached her breaking point. On the eve of Joe's Nobel Prize for Literature, the crown jewel in a spectacular body of work, Joan's coup de grace is to confront the biggest sacrifice of her life and secret of his career.
Written by
anonymous
Plot Synopsis:
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In 1992 in Connecticut, Joan Castleman (Glenn Close) can't sleep because her husband, Joe (Jonathan Pryce) is too nervous to sleep since they're expecting a call from the Nobel committee. The call finally comes, and they learn that Joe has indeed won the Nobel prize for literature. Thrilled, they jump up and down on the bed. Soon after, at a party held on Joe's behalf, their children Susannah (who is very pregnant) and David (Max Irons) arrive. Joan tells David she loved his short story, but Joe still hasn't read it, which frustrates David. While giving a speech, Joe says that without Joan he is nothing.

Joan, Joe, and David fly to Europe for the ceremony. On the plane, they are approached by Nathaniel Bone (Christian Slater), who wants to write Joe's biography. Joe is extremely annoyed with him and refuses to give him permission. When they land, they are greeted by the Nobel organizers, and Joe is assigned a young female photographer named Linnea. All the attention makes Joe a little agitated, and he asks Joan to listen to his heart since he's had heart issues before.

In flashback, we see Smith College, 1958. Young student Joan (Annie Starke) meets with her Professor, young Joe (Harry Lloyd). Joe is extremely impressed with her writing but thinks it needs a little work - he pushes her to go deeper with the characters. He asks her to babysit for his young child since he and his wife have plans. When she goes over to do so, he and his wife are yelling at each other. In his desk, she finds a walnut with a love note to his wife written on it.

In the present, the Castlemans attend more Nobel events. Joe tells people there that his wife doesn't write. Afterward, in the car, David and Joe get into another huge fight over David's sulky behavior. Joe admits he thinks David's story has potential but isn't good enough yet. David leaves, deciding to skip the rest of the day's activities. Joan tells Joe that some kind words wouldn't hurt, that "everyone needs approval." She asks Joe not to thank her in his Nobel acceptance speech that she doesn't want to be thought of as the long-suffering wife.

In flashbacks, Professor Castleman is impressed with Joan's improvements to her story, believing it to be about his wife. She denies this, but then they kiss. They go to a reading by female author Elaine Mozell (Elizabeth McGovern), who Joan admires. But Elaine tells Joan not to be a writer. Joan is horrified, but Elaine says that no one will read books by a female author.

In the present 1992, Joan is growing exhausted of all the events and takes an afternoon to herself. Nathaniel approaches her and invites her to have a drink. He tells her he's aware of Joe's many affairs and pushes her for a comment - Joan calmly tells him she is not a victim, and that she won't be painted that way. He tells her he found her writing from college, and that they were very good. Joan insists she has no regrets about giving it up. Nathaniel then tells him to read some of Joe's earliest work, and that it was fairly bad. He says that HER original writing reads the most like Joe's current-day writing. He implies that Joan is the real writer of Joe's many works, and urges her to speak out. She calmly denies all of it.

Meanwhile, Joe flirts with Linnea. He goes in to kiss her but his blood pressure medication goes off, and he decides to go back to his room. He writes her a little note on a walnut and then goes back. When Joan returns, Joe gets angry with her for going out and drinking and smoking - and then Joan finds the walnut. She gets angry with him for his constant philandering, and the fight continues until a phone call interrupts - Susannah had her baby. Joan and Joe are so thrilled they drop the fight. Afterward, they reunite with David. Joe tries to give David constructive criticism on his writing, and after they leave, Nathaniel approaches David.

In 1960 New York, Joan is a secretary at a publishing house. When an opportunity arises, she gets them to agree to read Joe's book, "The Walnut." But when Joan reads it first, she thinks the book never comes alive, and begins to give him feedback on it. Angry at the critique, Joe tells Joan he is leaving her. Joan begs him not to leave her, and he calms down. They agree the book story is compelling, but not the writing. Joan offers to "fix" it. After Joan's fix, the publishers want to publish the book. The two jump up and down on the bed in their tiny apartment.

Before the Nobel ceremony, David, furious, tells his parents Nathaniel told him his theory and told him that Joan confirmed it. Joan steadfastly denies that she wrote the books, but David remembers his mom going away into his father's office and locking herself away in there. David cries uncontrollably. In another flashback to1968 Connecticut, the Castleman's live in a large beautiful house in Connecticut. Joan writes books while Joe takes care of their young children.

At the Nobel ceremony, Joe dedicates his entire speech to Joan, which humiliates her. Disgusted, she flees the ceremony. In the car back to the hotel, Joan tells Joe she's leaving him and wants a divorce - she can't do it anymore. He tries to give her the Nobel prize, but she refuses, saying she doesn't want it. At the hotel, Joe tries to get her to reconsider, wanting to save the marriage, but the two descend into a massive argument, everything coming to the forefront - the lies, the writing, who the real talent is, the affairs - all of it comes up. Joan can't take the humiliation of standing at his side that his wife doesn't write. Suddenly, Joe has a heart attack. Joan calls for help, and as Joseph lays on the bed, he asks her if she loves him. She says yes, and he says "you're such a good liar." Help arrives, but they are unable to save Joe who dies.

On the plane home, Nathaniel apologizes to Joan for her loss. She tells him that if he writes about his theory, she will take him to court. David overhears, and Joan tells him when they get home she's going to tell him and his sister everything.

Annie Starke, who plays the young Joan, is the daughter of Glenn Close.
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Although the film was screened at film festivals in 2017 (and subsequently acquired for distribution), it was rumored to have been held for release until 2018 in order to give Glenn Close a better shot at an Oscar nomination.
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Though set in Stockholm, the majority of the film was shot in Glasgow.
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The development process for this film took fourteen years.
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Close approached Gary Oldman to play Joe Castleman but he was unavailable for the role.
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When the film was originally announced, Frances McDormand, Logan Lerman, and Brit Marling were part of the cast. When production finally began, though, all three had dropped out and were replaced by Elizabeth McGovern, Max Irons, and Annie Starke, respectively.
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Close and Pryce rehearsed around a table for a week before shooting began on the film.
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It is based on the novel of the same name by Meg Wolitzer.
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The Wife shot in Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Arbigland Estate in Dumfries.
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In the original Broadway production of "The Real Thing," Glenn Close played Jeremy Irons' lover. (Both won Tonys.); in Reversal of Fortune (1990) they played a married couple while in The House of the Spirits (1993) they played sister and brother. In "The Wife," Close plays the mother of Max Irons, Jeremy Irons' son.
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The Wife premiered at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival on 12 September 2017.
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Premiered at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival, after which it was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics for distribution.
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Early in the movie, Pryce's character quotes a sentence from the Don Quixote. Pryce was the "real" Don Quixote in the latest Terry Gilliam's movie 'The Man Who Killed Don Quixote'.
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Max Irons and Glenn Close also starred together in Crooked House (2017).
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Christian Slater and Glenn Close were seen filming at Glasgow Kelvin College Springburn Campus.
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Annie Starke gets an "Introducing" credit (usually reserved for an actor's very first appearance in a movie), even though she has been in three other movies: the 2001 made-for-TV musical South Pacific, Albert Nobbs (2011), and We Don't Belong Here (2017). South Pacific and Albert Nobbs both also starred Starke's mother, Glenn Close.
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Glenn Close and Jonathan Pryce were spotted on Cadogan Street, Glasgow, filming a scene in a black limousine on 29-30 November 2016.
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Jonathan Pryce and Harry Lloyd play older and younger versions of the same person. Both actors also appeared on Game of Thrones as totally unrelated characters.
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The name Joan Archer, as well as the short haircut and some of the characteristics of the role, point do the french heroine Jeanne D'Arc.
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The excerpt by James Joyce that gets quoted twice by Joseph Castleman is the very ending of the short story "The Dead", from his collection "Dubliners" (1914). There are some parallels between the short story and the movie, especially between the last scene in Joyce's work and the sequence right after the party celebrating the Novel Prize. The bedroom scene, after a party, where the wife has some "secret" to reveal is a strong parallel, as well as the shot of the snow "falling softly" on the living and the dead...
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An aerial shot of Stockholm shows a long, blue bus on a street. That type of bus was not yet in service in 1992.
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The Nobel dinner always takes place in The Blue hall in Stockholm City hall, and this looks distinctly different from the room used here.
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A shot from the bathroom in Grand Hotel in Stockholm shows an outlet of a type that is not used in Sweden.
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The limo that the Castlemans are being driven around Stockholm with has the wrong type of letters and numbers. In Sweden, another type of font is used on car plates.
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