Mystic River, Gone Baby Gone and Shutter Island. As far as book-to-film adaptations go, Dennis Lehane is batting a perfect 3-for-3, and with Warner Bros. behind two of those pictures, they are looking to score another success by enlisting Leonardo DiCaprio.

The studio has snapped up the rights to Lehane’s “Live By Night” which is being developed as a vehicle for Shutter Island star DiCaprio. And… that’s about it. The book doesn’t hit shelves or Kindles (or whatever) until this fall, so a synopsis or logline is unavailable, but it’s probably safe to say it will be dark and gritty and, if done right, worthy of awards attention when that time rolls around. And as usual, it’s one of many, many, many projects that DiCaprio is eyeballing at any moment — currently among them is Satori, the thriller based on the book by Don Winslow (which the author recently told us is still at script stage, as he’s working on it with Shane Salerno). The rest of the actor’s year is booked up finishing Django Unchained, shooting The Wolf Of Wall Street with Martin Scorsese and then doing some heavy promo for both Django and The Great Gatsby this fall.

But either way, Leo has his pick of projects so no matter what’s around the corner, we’re looking forward to it.

When you’re an actor as popular and talented as Leonardo DiCaprio, I imagine your office looks like a scene from Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory. The difference being, instead of delicious sweets, all the treats are the best scripts and properties in Hollywood and you can just pick and choose whatever you want. Work with Martin Scorsese, Christopher Nolan, Clint Eastwood, Baz Luhrmann and Quentin Tarantino all in succession and then have a bevy of high-end projects to choose from next such as The Wolf Of Wall Street (which he’ll shoot in August), The Devil In The White City and Satori, just to name a few. Not to mention he runs the company that’s developing Akira, The Twilight Zone and more.

One more property can now be added to the Leo list and, like the others, it comes with a staggering pedigree. Warner Bros. has acquried the rights to author Dennis Lehane‘s next novel, Live By Night, to star DiCaprio and be produced by his Appian Way Productions. Lehane is the author behind Oscar bait like Mystic River, Gone Baby Gone and Shutter Island.

“Live By Night” has yet to be published so there’s no official plot synopsis. However, according to Deadline who broke the story, it’s a follow-up to Lehane’s 2008 book “The Given Day” which was set right before World War I. “Live By Night” will follow several of those characters into the Prohibition era and, if it follows the same forumla, will set fictional drama against the backdrop of real-life events.

Warner Bros. also owns the rights to “The Given Day” and reportedly “Live By Night” will be followed up by a third book in an unofficial trilogy. There’s no word if they’ll attempt to produce them in order or consolidate.

With the book not being released until Fall and DiCaprio having a fair amount of projects on his plate, I wouldn’t hold your breath for this one. But, anything can happen as the star only has one more movie set in stone on his schedule.

Are you a Lehane fan? Does this sound like it has potential?

Leonardo DiCaprio is set to star in Live By Night based on Dennis Lehane’s new novel of the same name.

Leonardo DiCaprio is set to star in Live By Night.

The 37-year-old actor will produce the movie — based on Dennis Lehane’s new novel of the same name which tells the story of gangsters who run rum on a path from Cuba to Boston during prohibition — through his Appian Way Productions.

This won’t be the first time Leonardo has starred in a Lehane adaptation, he previously worked on Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island, based on a story by the Mystic River and Gone Baby Gone writer.

Leonardo is also developing Satori, the bestseller by “Savages” author Don Winslow, which he hopes to star in and produce.

The Hollywood hunk’s latest project will see him reunite with Scorsese for The Wolf Of Wall Street.

The J. Edgar actor — who has worked with the acclaimed director four times previously — will take a starring role in the movie, which is based on the memoir by Jordan Belfort and is set to start filming this summer.

The movie will tell the tale of a hard-partying drug-fuelled stockbroker who was indicted in 1998 for security fraud and money laundering and consequently served a 22 month prison stretch.

Sources: Indiewire, /Film and contactmusic.com

Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio and Samuel L. Jackson star in the director’s “Southern” about a slave who teams up with a bounty hunter to find his wife while tracking down a murderous pair of brothers.

Sony Pictures and the Weinstein Company released a synopsis Friday for Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained. The follow-up to Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds, the film tells the story of a slave in the antebellum South who agrees to help a bounty hunter track down a violent pair of fugitives in exchange for help in finding his long-lost wife.

According to the press release, the plot is as follows:

Set in the South two years before the Civil War, Django Unchained stars Academy Award®-winner Jamie Foxx as Django, a slave whose brutal history with his former owners lands him face-to-face with German-born bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Academy Award®-winner Christoph Waltz). Schultz is on the trail of the murderous Brittle brothers, and only Django can lead him to his bounty. The unorthodox Schultz acquires Django with a promise to free him upon the capture of the Brittles — dead or alive.

Success leads Schultz to free Django, though the two men choose not to go their separate ways. Instead, Schultz seeks out the South’s most wanted criminals with Django by his side. Honing vital hunting skills, Django remains focused on one goal: finding and rescuing Broomhilda (Kerry Washington), the wife he lost to the slave trade long ago.

Django and Schultz’s search ultimately leads them to Calvin Candie (Academy Award®-nominee Leonardo DiCaprio), the proprietor of “Candyland,” an infamous plantation where slaves are groomed by trainer Ace Woody (Kurt Russell) to battle each other for sport. Exploring the compound under false pretenses, Django and Schultz arouse the suspicion of Stephen (Academy Award®-nominee Samuel L. Jackson), Candie’s trusted house slave. Their moves are marked, and a treacherous organization closes in on them. If Django and Schultz are to escape with Broomhilda, they must choose between independence and solidarity, between sacrifice and survival…

Written and directed by Tarantino, Django Unchained will be released in the U.S. on December 25, 2012, and internationally by Sony Pictures. The film is produced by Stacey Sher, Reginald Hudlin and Pilar Savone. The executive producers are Harvey and Bob Weinstein, Michael Shamberg, Shannon McIntosh and James Skotchdopole.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

In a film that stars Leonardo DiCaprio it is an interesting move for the first promotional poster of Baz Lurhmann’s adaptation of the F. Scott Fitzgerald literary classic to have Carey Mulligan be the selling point. It is her face that eclipses that of DiCaprio’s, whose adjacent profile is barely existent.

Set to be released on Christmas Day, Lurhmann will attempt to channel the dark allure that the other cinematic adaptations of The Great Gatsby have lacked. It’s definitely a challenge for Lurhmann; his combination of rich visuals and cinematography will surely go to waste outside of the lavish parties in WASPy settings.

DiCaprio plays Jay Gatsby, the new-money socialite known for throwing lavish parties that appall the old-money upper-class. Mulligan plays Daisy Buchanan, a slice of upper-class crust, who at one time had strong feelings for Gatsby. She has since gone on to marry Tom (Joel Edgarton), an unfaithful husband who has a mistress (Isla Fisher). Tobey Maguire plays the Midwest-born Nick Carraway, the witness (and the story’s narrator) to the events that transpire among the elite-status individuals.

Source: insidepulse

Always a gentleman, Leonardo DiCaprio, snubbed by Oscar for J. Edgar, reportedly sent a bottle of Dom Perignon to each nominee in the acting categories. What a guy!

Source: Chicago Sun-Times

Dorothy’s ruby slippers may not be going home to Kansas, but they will be making a new home in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences museum.

The Academy announced Wednesday that thanks to a group of “angel donors” the slippers will be added to their new museum in Los Angeles. Crediting Leonardo DiCaprio along with Steven Spielberg and Terry Semel for the purchase, the Academy has hit a home run with the pumps.

This particular pair is in the best condition of the four pairs used in The Wizard of Oz, Entertainment Weekly reports. They are believed to have been used for close ups and for Judy Garland’s heel clicks to return to Kansas.

After spending 30 years in a storage bin, the slippers exchanged owners and have had very limited viewing engagements over the years. Now with a new home at the Academy’s museum, fans from all over the world can take a trip to Oz.

“The ruby slippers occupy an extraordinary place in the hearts of movie audiences the world over,” said Bob Iger, president and CEO of the Walt Disney Co. and chair of the capital campaign for the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, in a statement. “This is a transformative acquisition for our collection.”

Academy CEO Dawn Hudson was also thrilled at the gift and the slippers’ generous benefactors. “Leo’s passionate leadership has helped us bring home this legendary piece of movie history,” Hudson said, echoing Iger. “It’s a wonderful gift to the Academy museum project, and a perfect representation of the work we do year-round to preserve and share our film heritage.”

The museum is scheduled to open in LA’s historic May Company building, but no date has been set for the opening.

Source: TheCelebrityCafe.com

Leonardo Dicaprio should be back from Australia by now surely, the Oscar-snubbed actor has been in the southern hemisphere for the best part of the Autumn and into the winter, alongside fellow co-stars Toby Maguire and Carey Mulligan whilst they film Baz Luhrmann’s epic film adaptation of the great novel The Great Gatsby. Whilst they were no doubt expecting to be making an epic however, none of them were probably planning on the filming being quite so grand in scale as well.

DiCaprio, and indeed all the The Great Gatsby cast and crew are still in Australia, even though filming was supposed to wrap up before Christmas, as the production of the movie starts stretching well over time and — you’d presume — budget. Local press Adelaide Now have been spotting the crew around the region still, after their plans were spoiled by a wet summer down under. Trying to grab what sun they can, the Gatsby team are still, as a result, some way short of completing the filming work.

Rumors are that this is now eating into Luhrmann’s $120 million budget for the film, with some sources claiming to the Adelaide-based press that each day’s delay is costing him $1 million each time — figures that have been strenuously denied by a rep. It’s believed that set re-building is proving the main cost of the delays, with some cast members being paid extra to ensure they hold off other projects.

Source: Contactmusic

Nominee Leonard DiCaprio will not attend the SAG Awards as he heads back to Australia to film The Great Gatsby

Leonardo DiCaprio won’t be in Los Angeles tomorrow, although he’s nominated for a SAG Award as best actor. The J. Edgar star left for Australia yesterday for the set of Baz Luhrmann’s 3-D drama, The Great Gatsby. DiCaprio is up against Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Demian Bichir and Jean Dujardin for a SAG honor. A DiCaprio rep said the star had been scheduled to head Down Under before the awards were announced.

Source: New York Post

Leonardo DiCaprio is giving Sean Penn’s Haiti charity a boost by auctioning off the chance to party with him at a Hollywood bash.

The Titanic star has donated two tickets to one of his upcoming red carpet premieres, as well as passes to the after party.

The lucky winner and guest will then get the chance to pose for photographs with DiCaprio during a brief meet-and-greet session.
The Charity Buzz auction, which ends on February 9, is expected to fetch as much as $25,000 (£15,625) for the J/P Haitian Relief Organization.

Penn founded the charity to help Haitian families rebuild their lives in the wake of the devastating 2010 earthquake.

Source: Contactmusic

Leonardo DiCaprio and Michael Fassbender have discovered that there’s no room for them on the nominations list at this year’s Academy Awards as the yearly event threw up its usual array of surprise candidates and high profile snubs ahead of the final ceremony in Hollywood on February 26, 2012.

Whilst the awards season so far as largely been predictable, with The Artist, Hugo, Meryl Streep and George Clooney among the films and names dominating the nominations and awards over the past few weeks, you might’ve predicted that the biggest show of them all would tip the balance a little — something it’s duly done. DiCaprio and Fassbender may have a right to feel aggrieved at their absence from the category of Best Leading Actor, with the former earning nominations at both the Golden Globes and Screen Actors Guild Awards for his performance in J. Edgar whilst the latter impressed in Shame, gaining notable acclaim during last Autumn’s film festival season and also gaining Globe and Screen Actors nominations.

As it was Shame was snubbed entirely from the main honors, with legendary director Steven Spielberg also finding himself overlooked despite the positive reception to his film War Horse. So who was in? Well, as expected Hugo and The Artist both featured heavily, though there was even a surprise here as Hugo was nominated for 11 gongs of is rivals 10 — and the strongly tipped The Descendants even further back on a paltry five, behind the Brad Pitt starring Moneyball.

Source: Contactmusic

Leonardo DiCaprio doesn’t want to get back on board the Titanic.

The Hollywood hunk is wanted to help promote the 3-D relaunch of James Cameron’s 1997 Titanic blockbuster in which he starred opposite Kate Winslet.

But the actor isn’t so keen.

“Leo is not one for looking back,” says a source close to the actor.

“He’s proud of Titanic but it was 15 years ago.

“He doesn’t relish having to go back and promote that movie all over again — especially as it probably won’t need it.”

Source: ShowbizSpy