A couple of years after he first became attached to it, Guillermo Del Toro’s remake of 1947 crime noir Nightmare Alley may have landed a huge star. Variety reports Leonardo DiCaprio is in talks to lead the film, which will be Del Toro’s first since winning an Oscar for The Shape of Water.
Del Toro will be adapting William Lindsay Gresham’s 1946 novel, which was then turned into a 1947 movie starring Tyrone Power as a con artist working at a second-rate carnival who gets his comeuppance after stealing another’s successful mentalist trick. Del Toro co-wrote the new version’s script with Kim Morgan and it wouldn’t be surprising if he sprinkled in a little bit of the supernatural. I can see this one having a flavor similar to Crimson Peak, if handled the right way.
For DiCaprio this would be him returning to playing a con man after doing so quite well in Catch Me If You Can. It would also be his next role after starring in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which opens later this year.
