Tenzing Opens in Theaters Today — the Everest Story, Finally Told by the Man History Put Second

NEW YORK — FRIDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2026 — Everybody knows the name Edmund Hillary. Far fewer people know the name of the man standing next to him on top of the world. Tenzing, the Apple Original Film that opens in select theaters today, is here to fix that imbalance. Starring Genden Phuntsok as Tenzing Norgay and Tom Hiddleston as Hillary, it tells the story of the May 29, 1953 first confirmed ascent of Mount Everest — from the Sherpa's side of the rope. It is in theaters starting Friday before streaming globally on Apple TV on October 16, and it might be the most quietly radical casting decision of the year: one of the biggest movie stars on the planet, willingly playing second fiddle.

01 The name you know second

The history is settled and the imbalance is real. On May 29, 1953, New Zealand mountaineer Edmund Hillary and Himalayan climber Tenzing Norgay became the first people confirmed to stand on the summit of Mount Everest. Hillary became a global icon, a knight, a household name. Norgay — the gifted Sherpa climber without whom the expedition does not succeed — became, in most Western tellings, the other guy in the photograph. Tenzing reorients the entire story around him: his skill, his drive, his spiritual relationship with the mountain, and the fight to be treated as a climber rather than equipment.

The film's spine, as Apple describes it, is Tenzing's campaign — encouraged by his wife Dawa and aided by expedition secretary Jill Henderson — to persuade expedition leader Colonel John Hunt that he belongs on the British climbing team rather than merely serving it. What follows is an ascent shaped as much by the tensions of background, class, and competing ambition as by the perils of the mountain itself. High above the world, the film argues, empire and rank fall away, leaving two outsiders — a Sherpa and a Kiwi, both reminded daily that they are not quite English enough for the English expedition — bound by mutual respect and trust.

02 The team on the mountain and behind the camera

The casting is the thesis. Genden Phuntsok, a newcomer carrying the film's emotional weight, plays Tenzing opposite Hiddleston's Hillary — and the early word is that Hiddleston deliberately cedes the spotlight, playing Hillary as the first to recognize what Tenzing can do rather than as the hero of the piece. Willem Dafoe plays Colonel John Hunt, the expedition leader, reuniting with director Jennifer Peedom after narrating her 2017 documentary Mountain. Caitríona Balfe is Jill Henderson, the expedition secretary who becomes Tenzing's ally inside the British establishment, and Thinley Lhamo plays Dawa, Tenzing's wife, whose encouragement sets the story in motion.

Behind the camera, this is a serious pedigree. Peedom is the award-winning Australian documentary filmmaker behind Sherpa (2015) — the film that first made her name chronicling the Sherpa community's relationship with Everest — and this is her first narrative feature. The screenplay is by Luke Davies, with story by Peedom and Davies, and the producers include Liz Watts, Emile Sherman, and Iain Canning under their See-Saw Films banner, with Peedom, Davies, and Desray Armstrong also producing. Norbu Tenzing, Simon Gillis, and David Michôd executive produce. The production consulted with the late Kanchha Sherpa — the last surviving member of the original 1953 climb — which tells you how seriously the film takes getting the Sherpa side right.

03 Chomolungma, not Everest

The film's central tension is right there in the name. Where the Western climbers see Everest — a peak to be conquered, a flag to be planted — Tenzing reveres Chomolungma, the sacred mother goddess of Tibetan culture. Peedom has structured the story, building on the themes of Sherpa, around faith, belonging, and partnership rather than pure physical conquest. It is a meaningful reframing: most Everest movies are about the mountain as an obstacle, and this one is at least partly about the mountain as a presence — something the people who actually live beneath it have always understood.

That spiritual dimension is also what separates Tenzing from the standard-issue prestige biopic. The film reportedly makes room for Hillary's lifelong commitment to building schools and infrastructure across the Khumbu region alongside Norgay — the partnership did not end at the summit — and it does not sand down the uglier dynamics: the jealousy around Tenzing's place in the group, the inter-group tension of an outsider fighting for standing among men who hired him to carry their gear. The A.V. Club's review wrote that the film dedicates real time to those divisions, and credited it for widening the lens "so that the entire team gets credit for their fearless achievement, not just the white guys with passports." Hard to argue with that as a mission statement.

04 Last night in New York

Apple celebrated the film's New York premiere on Thursday night, October 8, and the turnout signaled how seriously the company is taking this one. In attendance were Hiddleston, Phuntsok, Dafoe, and Lhamo alongside Tenzin Jigmey, director-producer Peedom, writer-producer Davies, producer Watts, and cinematographer Stefan Duscio. Apple's Head of Features Matt Dentler was there, and so was Dhamey Tenzing Norgay — a descendant of Tenzing himself — which is the kind of premiere guest that tells you the family is behind the telling.

The premiere caps a rollout Apple has been building carefully: the official trailer dropped in September, and the film has been positioned as the streamer's big fall prestige play — the rare Apple Original getting a genuine theatrical window before it hits the service. For a company that sometimes treats theaters as an afterthought, the two-week exclusive run is a statement of intent.

05 The early word

The first reviews suggest the film earns its mountain. The A.V. Club's review calls it a conventional biopic that humanizes the Everest ascent — and means it as praise. The review wrote that Phuntsok walks a fine line between leading the Sherpas and earning the respect of the Englishmen who hired him, delivering a surprisingly emotional performance that carries the film even in its quietest moments. Hiddleston, meanwhile, "takes a step back from a narrative that has probably focused on Edmund exclusively over the years," which allows Phuntsok to stand out as the film's unmistakable lead. The review's closing argument, as the critic wrote, is that the film "restores a bit of humanity to the names left in the footnotes of history books for too long."

It is also, by all accounts, gorgeous — the kind of film that benefits enormously from a big screen and a loud sound system, which makes the theatrical window more than a formality. If you are deciding between the couch on October 16 and a theater this weekend, the mountain has a vote, and it is voting theater.

06 How to watch

Tenzing opens in select theaters on Friday, October 9, 2026, and begins streaming globally on Apple TV on October 16 — mark the date, because it is landing right in the middle of a stacked streaming weekend (see our weekend watchlist for the full damage). And if biopics are your thing this week, do not miss A24's Anthony Bourdain movie, still in theaters and doing the same trick in a kitchen instead of on a glacier. October is not messing around.