Biopic on NJ legend planned with Leonardo DiCaprio and JLaw

Some very big talent of today may be paying tribute to an enormous talent of years gone by. And New Jersey might want to know about this.

One of Jersey’s biggest stars of all time could have a biopic made about his life. Hoboken’s favorite son, Frank Sinatra.

This has long been a dream of director Martin Scorsese’s and it’s been an on-again-off-again project since 2009. For 15 years the famous filmmaker has wanted to put a biopic together on the crooner and Variety recently said it might all be back on the table. There’s talk that Leonardo DiCaprio is being tapped by Scorsese for the lead role.

DiCaprio has been in six Scorsese films to date. The 49-year-old actor would play opposite Jennifer Lawrence as Ava Gardner, ole blue eyes’ second wife.

The only thing standing in the way? They need to get a script past Sinatra’s daughter Tina. She controls the estate.

Scorsese tried back in 2017 when things got close to finally happening after seven years of trying, but the family pulled the plug on it because they felt the script at the time was covering too many of the darker parts of Sinatra’s life.

Scorsese meanwhile says he won’t do the project as a whitewash and that Tina will need to come to terms with the fact her father was simply more complicated than most people.

"Certain things are very difficult for a family, and I totally understand,” he said. “But, if they expect me to be doing it, they can’t hold back certain things. The problem is that the man was so complex. Everybody is so complex — but Sinatra in particular."

It sounds like Scorsese has a huge respect for Sinatra and a huge interest in the project and I imagine he would give it the reverence it would deserve. Plus with two Academy Award winners in the lead roles it’s hard to imagine it not being great.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Jeff Deminski only.

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