Not to alarm anyone but Barry Keoghan has teased a deleted Saltburn kissing scene

I am screaming, crying, begging for a director’s cut


More than two months on and we’re all still sat here obsessing with Saltburn. To say the film has us in its clutches would be an understatement. But what is it about Emerald Fennel’s feature length that has got us so tightly wrapped around it’s little linger? Is it all the subtle but seriously clever foreshadowing that you’d never notice on your first watch and practically spoils it’s own plot? Is it the nostalgia it evokes for the fashion, music and trends of the noughties, a time period most of its viewers were too young to remember? Or, could it possibly be the fact it stars two devastatingly handsome leads whose will-they-won’t-they homoerotic relationship on and off the screen leaves all their fans with baited breath? No, it’s definitely not that.

And now, as if we couldn’t be even more obsessed with Saltburn than we already are, Barry Keoghan has teased the existence of a deleted kissing scene that didn’t make the final cut. Watching the Australian and Irish actor interact during their promotion for the Amazon Prime original, it’s clear that the two get on like a house on a fire and are very good friends. And like a like a lot of other good friends, enjoy innocently flirting with each other.

In an interview with GQ, Barry spoke of his and Jacob’s relationship: “I’m really flirtin’. We were constantly close. It ain’t just for the cameras and the premiere. Me and Jacob—he’s like a brother to me, honestly. I think when you’re comfortable with someone, you can be as close as you want, you know what I mean?

“It’s not like, ‘Oh, don’t come near me’—it’s like, I’m comfortable. When I’m comfortable around people, I’m comfy. But I’m comfortable with Jacob. Messin’ about. Havin’ a laugh. We’re bein’ lads.”

Adding a throwaway remark, the Dublin-born actor inadvertently let slip that Saltburn may originally have contained a deleted kissing scene: “We’ve just done a movie where we had to kiss, man. Look at the scenes we’ve done. You have to be comfortable with yourself.”

With Oliver’s desire to absolutely consume Saltburn in it’s entirety, along with /that/ grave scene, a kiss shared between Oliver and Felix would not be out of place in the cut of the film we know. Fans are now going absolutely feral about the prospect of a deleted kissing scene and are calling on Emerald Fennel to release an extended director’s cut of Saltburn that includes it. However whether this will ever happen, one can only hope.

Saltburn, the new film by Emerald Fennell, is streaming on Amazon Prime now. For all the best film, music, reality TV and entertainment news, like Pop Culture Shrine on Facebook

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Featured image via Amazon Prime.