Main cast
- Owen Wilson as Gil Pender
- Rachel McAdams as Inez
- Marion Cotillard as Adriana, fictionalised mistress of Picasso
- Tom Hiddleston as F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Alison Pill as Zelda Fitzgerald
- Corey Stoll as Ernest Hemingway
- Adrien Brody as Salvador Dalí
- Kathy Bates as Gertrude Stein
- Michael Sheen as Paul Bates
- Nina Arianda as Carol Bates
- Carla Bruni as Museum guide
- Kurt Fuller as John, Inez's father
- Mimi Kennedy as Helen, Inez's mother
- Léa Seydoux as Gabrielle
Supporting cast
- Yves Heck as Cole Porter
- Sonia Rolland as Josephine Baker
- Daniel Lundh as Juan Belmonte
- Thérèse Bourou-Rubinsztein as Alice B. Toklas
- Marcial Di Fonzo Bo as Pablo Picasso
- Emmanuelle Uzan as Djuna Barnes
- Tom Cordier as Man Ray
- Adrien de Van as Luis Buñuel
- Serge Bagdassarian as Detective Duluc
- Gad Elmaleh as Detective Tisserant
- David Lowe as T. S. Eliot
- Yves-Antoine Spoto as Henri Matisse
- Laurent Claret as Leo Stein
- Vincent Menjou Cortes as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
- Olivier Rabourdin as Paul Gauguin
- François Rostain as Edgar Degas
- Karine Vanasse as Belle Époque woman
- Michel Vuillermoz as King in Versailles
- Catherine Benguigui as Maxim's Hostess
- Audrey Fleurot as Partygoer
- Guillaume Gouix as Partygoer
Notes on the cast
Owen is a natural actor. He doesn't sound like he's acting, he sounds like a human being speaking in a situation, and that's very appealing to me. He's got a wonderful funny bone, a wonderful comic instinct that's quite unlike my own, but wonderful of its kind. He's a blond Texan kind of Everyman's hero, the kind of hero of the regiment in the old war pictures, with a great flair for being amusing. It's a rare combination and I thought he'd be great.
—Woody Allen, in production notes about the film[6]
This is the second time McAdams and Wilson co-starred as a couple; they did so before in 2005's Wedding Crashers. In comparing the two roles, McAdams describes the one in Midnight in Paris as being far more antagonistic than the role in Wedding Crashers.[7] Allen had high praise for her performance and that of co-star Marion Cotillard.[8] Cotillard was cast as Wilson's other love interest, the charismatic Adriana.
Carla Bruni, singer-songwriter and wife of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy, was recruited by Allen for a role as a museum guide.[9] There were false reports that Allen re-filmed Bruni's scenes with Léa Seydoux, but Seydoux rebuffed these rumors revealing she had an entirely separate role in the film.[10] Allen also shot down reports that a scene with Bruni required over 30 takes: "I am appalled. I read these things and I could not believe my eyes ... These are not exaggerations, but inventions from scratch. There is absolutely no truth." He continued to describe Bruni as "very professional" and insisted he was pleased with her scenes, stating that "every frame will appear in the film."[11][12]
