Ever since it landed a director in Ruben Fleischer, Warner Bros.’ 1940s-set crime drama Gangster Squad has been gathering a solid cast of actors. Now one more is aboard, in the shape of Michael Pena.
Squad already boasts an embarrassment of acting riches, with Sean Penn, Josh Brolin and Ryan Gosling already signed to play the leads.
Birthed from Paul Lieberman’s LA Times feature and adapted by former cop Will Beall, the film finds an embattled LAPD poisoned by corruption and looking to find a way to gather reliable, honest cops to take down freshly arrived east coast gangster/ gambler Mickey Cohen (Penn). It’s no easy task, as Cohen has deep pockets and plenty of police officers willing to do his bidding for the right payoff.
But the special team is eventually rounded up, including straight arrow John O’Mara (Brolin) and Gosling’s Jerry Wooters, a playboy with the ladies who also plays by the rule of law.
Pena is aboard to play an officer looking to show he’s got the right stuff to win a place on the team, while Anthony Mackie has also been rumoured for a role.
Fleischer is in pre-production now, and we expect to see more big names sign up before too long...