Robert De Niro to Play Tommy Lasorda in Reid Carolin's ‘Tommy & Me'

Now this is peculiar casting.

According to Deadline, Robert De Niro is in talks to play legendary Los Angeles Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda in “Tommy & Me,” a sports drama Reid Carolin will direct for Skydance Sports.

George Gallo (“Midnight Run”), Cambron Clark and Carolin wrote the script. Plot details are being kept under wraps, so we don't yet know how thorough a biopic this will be. The title hints at the latter, maybe a story told through the eyes of someone in Lasorda's orbit.

If you're not a baseball person, here's the short version. Lasorda was a journeyman pitcher who who rose through the Dodgers organization, eventually managing the club for a whopping twenty years— from 1976 to 1996 — winning four NL pennants and two World Series titles. He was also one of the sport's most colorful, emotional and gloriously foul-mouthed personalities, which makes De Niro such an interesting fit.

Carolin co-directed “Dog” with Channing Tatum, producing partner, and has the Amazon/MGM motorcycle racing drama “Isle of Man” coming up.

De Niro is coming off Netflix's “The Whisper Man,” which drew around 55M views in its first two weeks, and will next be seen in “Focker-in-Law,” due November 25. De Niro doesn't always pick his projects carefully these days, but give him a strongly written character and he can still surprise you. Hopefully that happens here.

Although I’ve been disappointed by many of the projects he’s taken on over the past couple of decades, I still find myself following whatever De Niro signs onto next. I can’t help it. There’s still hope there—I believe he’s still capable of something truly special. That’s only happened a handful of times since 2000, five by my count: “The Irishman,” “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “Meet the Parents,” “Silver Linings Playbook,” and “The Intern.” That’s it.