A previously inactive project involving Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio is now appearing more feasible.
Scorsese initiated plans nine years ago to adapt Erik Larsen’s best-selling nonfiction thriller, Devil in the White City, which DiCaprio acquired the rights to in 2010.
Progress on Scorsese’s film adaptation halted when it was announced that the book would instead be adapted for television by director Todd Field, with Keanu Reeves starring.
However, this adaptation never materialized, and according to Deadline, 20th Century is now managing the project with Scorsese and DiCaprio once more involved. The Independent has reached out to 20th Century for a statement.
Set in 1893, the gripping book intertwines the stories of two men: Daniel H Burnham, an architect and urban designer responsible for the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago, and Henry Holmes, a deceitful con artist, bigamist, and serial killer, who exploited the fair to lure between 27 and 200 victims to his intricately constructed “Murder Castle.”
DiCaprio is reportedly negotiating to portray Holmes.
There is uncertainty about what the 82-year-old director Scorsese’s next film will be. In 2023, it was reported that Scorsese would take on another book by David Grann following 2023’s Killers of the Flower Moon.
Grann informed the French publication Télérama that the filmmaker was planning to adapt The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder.
Both Scorsese and his frequent collaborator Leonardo DiCaprio have secured the rights to the novel, published earlier this year. The story revolves around shipwreck survivors who, six months after their return, are accused of mutiny by three men.
However, in 2024, Scorsese appeared to disclose that his upcoming project will actually be an 80-minute film about Jesus, adapted from A Life of Jesus by Silence author Shūsaku Endō.
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