Johnny Depp Will Get Gangster as Whitey Bulger In "Black Mass"

Johnny Depp has returned to a star in the Warner Bros. produced film, Black Mass, Variety reports. Depp was previously attached to the project, but it has been speculated that he dropped out of the project due to a financial dispute—a proposed cut in his standard $20 million per film pay. 

Depp will play Whitey Bulger, a ruthless mobster and head of Boston's Winter Hill Gang. He was notoriously on the lam for 16 years and is currently serving two life sentences, plus five years, for 11 murders.

The film's source material comes from the book Black Mass: The True Story of an Unholy Alliance Between the FBI and the Irish Mob which was co-written by Boston Globe reporters Dick Lehr and Gerard O’Neill. Mark Mallouk has adapted the script.

Joel Edgerton will play FBI agent and friend to Bulger, John Connolly, and Scott Cooper will direct.

Black Mass is scheduled to release in October 2015.

[via Variety]