The Batman Casts John Turturro As Mob Boss Falcone

The Batman director Matt Reeves has confirmed John Turturro is playing the mob boss Carmine Falcone in his upcoming DC Comics adaptation. As the Worlds of DC (or DC Extended Universe, as it’s unofficially known) continues to evolve over the next few years, it will introduce even more DC superheroes to the big screen (such as Black Adam), while at the same time releasing new installments in hit sub-franchises like Aquaman and Wonder Woman. There’s also a brand-new Batman film on the horizon, but with Robert Pattinson taking over as Bruce Wayne from Ben Affleck.

Casting updates for The Batman have been coming in fast and hot of late, well ahead of the start of production in 2020 and release a year later. Recently, the film added Zoë Kravitz as Catwoman, along with Paul Dano as Riddler, Andy Serkis as Alfred Pennyworth, Colin Farrell as Penguin, and newcomer Jayme Lawson in an unknown role, all on top of Jeffrey Wright as Commissioner Jim Gordon. Today brings yet another casting announcement for the film, and this time straight from Reeves himself.

Reeves took to Twitter to reveal that Turturro is playing mobster Carmine Falcone in The Batman. You can check out his tweet, below.

This isn’t the first time Carmine Falcone has been portrayed in the live-action Batman universe; the mob boss previously appeared in Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins in 2005 (where he was played by Tom Wilkinson) and, more recently, on the Fox TV series Gotham (where John Doman brought him to life). Falcone’s confirmation for The Batman is especially intriguing, given that fans have been speculating the film will partly draw inspiration from Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale’s comic book storyline, The Long Halloween. In that mini-series, Falcone and his family find themselves being hunted by a serial killer (known as Holiday), which drives him to recruit a number of Batman villains to work for him. Between Falcone’s confirmation, the number of classic Bat-rogues that’ve already been announced for The Batman, and Reeves’ longstanding claim that Batman will be more of a detective in the movie, it seems this particular theory may yet pan out.

Either way, Reeves has assembled an excellent team of character actors for The Batman. Outside of the original Transformers movie trilogy, Turturro has typically stayed away from big studio releases, opting to work with auteurs like the Coen Brothers and Spike Lee instead. Clearly, however, he feels highly enough about whatever Reeves is cooking up to dive into the world of modern superhero movies and play a key character himself. He’s certainly a welcome addition to The Batman, too, and gives DC fans yet another reason to look forward to this new take on the Caped Crusader.