The Christophers (2026) Plot Summary & Ending Explained

Lori Butler, Michaela Coel is a young artist who hasn’t exhibited in years and is drawn into a calculated plan by Julian Sklar’s unscrupulous children to finish the Christophers behind his back after his death. Julian Sklar, Ian McKellen, is a renowned painter based in London, now elderly and eccentric. In the 1990s, he completed two series of paintings called The Christophers based on a former lover; a third series remains unfinished, and he has not worked on them in years. His reputation has faded as he has aged, even as his current life includes long sessions of recording Cameos for his fans to earn a living.

His unscrupulous children, Barnaby Sklar James Corden and Sallie Milton Sklar Jessica Gunning, hatch a plan to hire Lori to pose as Julian’s assistant and finish the paintings behind his back so they can cash in after his death. Lori meets Julian, who spends much of his time on Cameos to sustain himself, and she quickly becomes entangled in the painter’s circle. He soon orders her to shred the unfinished Christophers; instead, she forges doubles of each painting and shredds the fakes, a move that seeds distrust and signals that she is not merely a hired help but a collaborator with her own artistic stake.

Julian, sharper than he initially appears, soon deduces that Lori is an artist in her own right and that she has been brought in by his children. She confesses, and their relationship deepens as she proves her knowledge of his work and offers pointed critiques of his second Christophers series. When Barnaby and Sallie visit to check on progress, Lori and Julian manage to fool them into believing that the shredded fakes were the real paintings, foiling the siblings’ scheme and introducing a fragile trust between artist and mentor. Julian makes a bold, and controversial, move: he intends to burn the unfinished third series, but Lori resists, and she challenges him to do it himself if that is what he truly wants.

With a tense hesitation, Julian leads the two of them back to his studio, and he decides to finish the series in a way that would render them unsaleable. In a moment of twisted artistic joy, he adds glitter, feathers and other ornaments to two of the unfinished works before stopping. He accuses Lori of manipulating him into finishing the paintings and savages her work, which he has even been able to assess online. Hurt and disillusioned, she leaves his employ.

Frustrated but calculating, Lori briefly reconnects with Barnaby and Sallie and attempts another angle, guessing they have already sold the paintings and are deep in debt. Later, Julian visits Lori at home and admits that it was wrong to judge her work without seeing it in person. He realizes that years earlier, he had harshly criticized her on a television program, an act that helped push her from exhibiting. They repair their relationship, and he asks her to return to work for him in a week or so. Before she can, Julian dies, found by his masseuse with a paintbrush in hand, a moment that shifts the entire landscape of the unfinished legacy.

Sometime after, Lori takes the real Christophers from the house and forges a letter in Julian’s name granting ownership of the works to Christopher, Julian’s former lover. At a museum show honoring Julian’s legacy, Christopher displays the portraits—now finished in the “unsalable” style that Julian had begun to revive—leaving it unclear whether Lori or Julian actually completed them. Beside these, Lori unveils a contemporary piece honoring Julian by compiling dozens of his Cameo videos, a testament to his far-reaching influence and to the way art, life, and reputation have become intertwined in unexpected ways. The masseuse delivers Julian’s final painting to Lori—a self-portrait unfinished—signed “for Lori” on the back, a last, enigmatic gesture that leaves the true author of the final works open to interpretation.

Sallie and Barnaby’s plan depends on Lori completing Julian’s unfinished Christopher series well enough for the works to be sold as originals. They have already promised the paintings to a businessman who intends to disguise the purchase as charity for a tax advantage, and they blackmail Lori with an earlier shady transaction when she tries to withdraw. Lori first tells them the originals were shredded, although they are actually waiting outside to be burned according to Julian’s wishes. Her refusal to destroy them makes Julian confront his own attachment to the series. He brings the canvases back to the studio intending to finish them badly as an insult to his children, only to discover that even his sabotage produces compelling work. The fragile collaboration collapses when he attacks Lori’s worth as an artist. Later he recognizes her Untitled No. 7 as the painting that had stayed in his memory, understands that his cruelty helped destroy her confidence, and apologizes at her studio. They agree to work together the following week, but Julian dies before that can happen. Lori ultimately gives Sallie and Barnaby the Christophers, yet neither sibling can authenticate who completed them. She also forges a letter in Julian’s name granting the works to his muse, Owen Christopher Appleton, who presents them at an exhibition. Whether the final surfaces belong to Julian, Lori, or both remains deliberately unprovable.

The missing authentication is not merely a caper twist; it overturns every character’s attempt to make authorship serve ownership. Sallie and Barnaby need a clean Julian signature because his name converts paint into a financial instrument. Julian initially treats Lori as an inferior imitator because defending the singularity of his talent protects both his ego and market value. Lori, however, knows the work closely enough to identify the private experiences behind it, and Julian’s recognition of her old painting proves that influence has already moved in both directions. Her forged letter is unlawful and self-interested, but it also blocks the children’s tax scheme and directs the series toward the muse whose presence helped generate it. The exhibition therefore rests on several incompatible truths: the paintings may contain Julian’s hand, Lori’s labor, Owen’s history, and the children’s coercion at once. Instead of resolving those claims, the ending removes the expert signature that would rank them. Viewers are left to look at the Christophers without the certainty the buyers demand, which is precisely the position Julian and Lori’s aborted collaboration made possible.