As he prepares to start shooting The Great Gatsby early next month, Baz Luhrmann has been filling in some of the smaller parts of his adaptation of F Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, adding Callan McAuliffe and Gemma Ward to the cast.

Gatsby already features Leonardo DiCaprio, Isla Fisher, Carey Mulligan, Tobey Maguire, Joel Edgerton and Jason Clarke in the central roles of the rich playboy Jay Gatsby and the ill-fated couples/friends who orbit his charismatic centre.

Luhrmann, who is shooting the movie down under, is boosting the Oz contingent in the cast even further despite the presence of Fisher, Edgerton and Clarke. McAuliffe, last seen as Alex Pettyfer’s geeky, alien-obsessed friend Sam in I Am Number Four, is on to play the younger version of DiCaprio’s leading man.

Ward, a fellow Aussie and former model, menaced the leads The Strangers and was one of the mermaids in this year’s On Stranger Tides. While Entertainment Weekly brings word of her casting, there’s no news as to exactly which role she’ll play just yet, though there has been speculation that it'll be Catherine, the sister to Fisher's Myrtle Wilson.

With a script by Luhrmann and regular co-writer Craig Pearce, The Great Gatsby will grace our screens in 3D next year.