# Inside the Making of Marie Antoinette, 20 Years On

> A new photo book opens the gates on Sofia Coppola's Versailles, laptops, macarons and all.
- Title: Inside the Making of Marie Antoinette, 20 Years On | Shortify
- Summary: A new photo book opens the gates on Sofia Coppola's Versailles, laptops, macarons and all. Coppola's Versailles worked because she let the modern world stay…
- Keywords: film, photography, sofia coppola, fashion, books, Inside, Making, Marie, Antoinette, Years, Vanity Fair
- Source: Vanity Fair — https://vanityfair.com/photos/marie-antoinette-photography-book
- Author: Daniela Tijerina
- Published: 2026-09-14T19:50:07.163+00:00
- Read time: 1 min
- Topics: film, photography, sofia coppola, fashion, books
## 1,800 frames at Versailles
Andrew Durham shot more than 1,800 photographs on the set of Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette, carrying a Contax 35-mm camera through a Palace of Versailles almost no one gets to work inside.
## The laptop in the wig
One frame catches Kirsten Dunst and Jason Schwartzman in powdered wigs and crown jewels, wearing wired headphones and hunched over an Apple laptop in the palace halls.
## A time warp on purpose
That collision of centuries is the whole thesis. Coppola shot a period piece as a decadent coming-of-age story, and let the present stay visible inside it.

> The image is a time warp
## Forty million in sugar
The budget ran to $40 million and you can see where it went: piles of pastel Ladurée macarons, towering fresh flower arrangements, and endless French opulence.
## Converse and new romantics
A pair of baby blue Converse sits in the costume pile, matched by a punk, new-romantic-era soundtrack. The anachronisms were the point, not the accident.
## Naps, smokes, and guards
Durham's candids are the unglamorous middle: Dunst asleep in the Musée des Archives Nationales, palace guards resting, extras on a cigarette break, a carriage shot being rigged.
## The book, and the oral history
Making Marie Antoinette comes out on Coppola's own imprint, Important Flowers, paired with a star-studded oral history of the film by Vogue editor Keaton Bell.

> Though the French queen never actually said "Let them eat cake," the volume evokes the same delicious directive.
## Key takeaway

Coppola's Versailles worked because she let the modern world stay in the frame instead of hiding it.