Martin Scorsese to Direct ‘Midnight Vendetta’ — Tackles 1890 Mafia in New Orleans

I’m told that Martin Scorsese has a project currently in development that has yet to be reported on, and compared to some of the other projects he has going, it actually has a completed script.

Scorsese’s tentatively titled “Midnight Vendetta,” which just had its script submitted by the great Eric Roth (“The Insider,” “Munich”), will tackle the Mafia’s arrival in New Orleans around 1890, which marked the first major foothold of organized Italian crime in the United States.

Sicilian immigrants, many fleeing poverty and violence back home, settled in the city’s port neighborhoods, bringing with them old-world networks and rivalries. Tensions quickly escalated between local authorities and the growing Italian community, culminating in the infamous murder of Police Chief David Hennessy in 1890.

Hennessy reportedly blamed “the Dagoes” with his dying breath, triggering one of the largest lynchings in U.S. history when a mob stormed the jail and killed 11 Italian men, some with suspected Mafia ties. This event thrust the Sicilian Mafia into the national spotlight and etched New Orleans into the origin story of organized crime in America.

No surprise, I’m told Leonardo DiCaprio is yet again attached to this latest Scorsese project, although no deal has been signed. Roth previously worked with Scorsese, writing one of the later drafts of “Killers of the Flower Moon.”

Scorsese, 82, is currently working on a wide array of projects, and what might be his next film is still very much up for debate. Many of them, including “Devil in the White City” and the untitled Dwayne Johnson Hawaiian mob movie, don’t have a finished script. “Midnight Vendetta” does.

It was just a week ago that we learned Leonardo DiCaprio decided to drop out of Damien Chazelle’s “Evel Knievel Goes on Tour,” which was supposed to shoot this summer, to prioritize a new Scorsese. It seems like something is definitely imminent.