Summary
- Martin Scorsese's sets The Wager as his next project, which will see him once again reunite with Leonardo DiCaprio and Apple Original Films.
- The movie is based on David Grann's (Killers of the Flower Moon) novel The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder.
- DiCaprio's specific role is yet to be confirmed, but the book chronicles the real story of the crew of HMS Wager, a British Royal Navy ship that wrecked on a deserted island in 1741.
Martin Scorsese sets The Wager as his next project, and it's set to reunite him once more with star Leonardo DiCaprio. After first working with DiCaprio on Gangs of New York, the actor has become a staple in the filmmaker's movies. The duo most recently worked together on Apple's Killers of the Flower Moon, which chronicles the murders of members of the Osage Nation during the 1920s after oil is discovered on their land.
Now, ahead of Killers of the Flower Moon's wide release, Scorsese reveals to The Times (via Collider) that the next project he films will be The Wager. The project, which was first announced last year, will star DiCaprio and mark another collaboration between the filmmaker and Apple Original Films. The movie is based on David Grann's novel The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, with the author also responsible for writing the Killers of the Flower Moon book.
What To Expect From The Wager
Each time that DiCaprio has collaborated with Scorsese, the actor has played a wildly different role. From playing a tortured detective in Shutter Island, to a drug-fueled stockbroker in The Wolf of Wall Street, to a nefarious criminal in Killers of the Flower Moon, DiCaprio clearly likes to reinvent himself with each new role, and The Wager seems like it will be no exception.
Grann's novel chronicles the real events that befell the crew of HMS Wager, a ship of the British Royal Navy that was wrecked on a deserted island in 1741 off the coast of what is now Chile. It's not yet clear who DiCaprio will be playing in the film, but it's possible that he will be playing Captain David Cheap. After becoming marooned on the island, much of Cheap's crew mutinied against him, abandoning him and several of his loyal sailors on what would subsequently become known as Wager Island.
If DiCaprio does indeed play Cheap, it will mark a shift from his Killers of the Flower Moon character, Ernest Burkhart, who is a fairly deplorable individual. It remains to be seen how Scorsese will tackle Grann's source material, but the novel is unflinching in its portrayal of the events that befall the crew. The Wager doesn't yet have a release date, but the with filmmaker affirming that it will be his next project, a 2024 start for filming seems likely.