Martin Scorsese’s modern gangster classic The Departed will be a series.
The Departed, Martin Scorsese’s 2006 modern mob classic starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson and Mark Wahlberg, is coming to TV as a series. The Oscar-winning movie will get a reboot as a crime drama series from Amazon Studios as well as the original film’s producers Vertigo Entertainment, Initial Entertainment Group and Plan B Entertainment. This is the first time Amazon has bought anything from Warner Bros. TV.
The script for The Departed series was written Jason Richman, who created Detroit 1-8-7.
The original film was set in Boston where Irish Mob boss Francis "Frank" Costello, played by Nicholson, paid for Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) to complete police training and get set up in the Massachusetts State Police. DiCaprio plays William "Billy" Costigan, who pretends to get kicked off state trooper force so he can go undercover in Costello’s mob. Kind of like what Edward G. Robinson did in the gangster classic Bullets or Ballots, which put him up against mob kingpin Humphrey Bogart.
The Departed was loosely based on real life gangster Whitey Bulger and his childhood friend, FBI agent John Connolly.
The Departed will update the double-blind-undercover aspect of the original film. The series will be is set in present-day Chicago. A young cop will go undercover to get the goods on a Latino crime gang, while, who have their own inside man undercover in blue.
The original The Departed was written by William Monahan. It was a remake of the 2002 Hong Kong film Infernal Affairs. Wahlberg was nominated for Best Supporting Actor. The Departed also featured Martin Sheen, Ray Winstone, Vera Farmiga, Anthony Anderson, and Alec Baldwin. It won best picture, best director and best adapted screenplay Academy Awards. It was made for $90 million and made $290 million.
The Departed series stems from a two-year deal Amazon made with Vertigo at the end of 2015. This is the first project in the pact.
Amazon recently picked up Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan as a series. That will star John Krasinski.
SOURCE: VARIETY
