EXCLUSIVE: One of the biggest pic packages is about to land at Disney, Deadline hears. This is the pitch for a Martin Scorsese-directed drama that would star Dwayne Johnson, Leonardo DiCaprio and Emily Blunt. The thumbnail description: imagine Robert De Niro’s Goodfellas’ Jimmy the Gent character, but as a ruthless Hawaiian crime boss, also based on a real figure, who battled encroaching rivals for control of organized crime in Hawaii. Deadline broke the project in February. It is a pricey package given the local and above the line starpower and numerous distributors were bidding.
The pitch, written by Nick Bilton, focuses on a turbulent time on the island paradise when the aspiring mob boss battled elements like triads and U.S. military to wrest control. It was a bloody battle. The character is based on Wilford “Nappy” Pulawa, who led the largest organized crime syndicate on the Hawaiian Islands, The Company, in the 1970s. He ruled through a reputation for brutality and murder, terrain Scorsese covered in both Goodfellas and The Departed. The Company’s rackets included gambling, human trafficking, marijuana trafficking and labor corruption. Eventually charged with two murders, got 15 years for tax evasion in 1973, and he reputedly continued to run the syndicate from his cell in a federal prison before he was . In 1975, Nevada barred him for life from entering the state’s casinos. He continued to run the syndicate from federal prison before his release in 1984.
Producers include Scorsese, Johnson, Blunt, DiCaprio, Bilton, Dany Garcia, Lisa Frechette and Rick Yorn.
I’ll relay more when it becomes official. It is a career opportunity for Johnson, and it sounds like David Greenbaum has been the driving force here. He took the reins to be ambitious and this sure fits that bill. Stay tuned.
