Summary
- Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio's scrapped project, The Devil in the White City, would have been their darkest collaboration yet, focusing on notorious serial killer H. H. Holmes and his "Murder Castle."
- While the historical accuracy of Holmes's crimes is debated, there is no doubt that his story would have made for a gripping and gruesome biopic.
- The project, initially planned as a movie, transitioned to a TV show with Keanu Reeves in the lead role, but it has since been abandoned. However, Scorsese and DiCaprio remain attached as executive producers if it ever moves forward.
While Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio have made some seriously dark projects together, one canceled show they were collaborating on would have outdone them all in of its disturbing impact. Scorsese and DiCaprio’s history of working together began with 2002’s Gangs of New York and continued with 2004’s The Aviator, but it was with 2006’s The Departed that the pair hit their stride. The grimy police thriller stars DiCaprio as an undercover cop investigating the mob, and it makes the gangsters of Scorsese's earlier movies look like gentlemen as it explores an even nastier side of the criminal underworld.
Their next movie together, 2010's Shutter Island, is a brutally bleak film noir that stars DiCaprio as a troubled cop investigating a creepy sanitarium. While that collaboration has some problems, 2013’s The Wolf of Wall Street saw the pair return to critical acclaim with a blackly comic look at insider trading, stock market corruption, and capitalist greed. Scorsese and DiCaprio's studies of hubris, excess, and wanton violence peaked in 2023 with Killers of the Flower Moon, a dark historical epic that chronicles the murder of an Indigenous American family by one of their white husbands and his corrupt uncle. Before it, though, the director and actor almost went even darker.
The Devil In The White City Would've Been A Super Dark Scorsese & DiCaprio Movie
As brutal as Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio’s completed collaborations are, none of them can compete with one unmade project the duo was attached to years ago. With the original plans for Scorsese to direct and DiCaprio to star, The Devil in the White City was going to be about the notorious serial killer H. H. Holmes and his horrific "Murder Castle," as adapted from Erik Larson's book of the same name. Holmes is considered America's first serial killer, and although the historical details of his so-called “Murder Castle” are hotly debated, there is no doubt that the sensationalist story of Holmes’s crimes would have made for a gripping, gruesome biopic.
Although the reality of his killings might have been less dramatic than some contemporary sources claimed, Holmes did commit a staggering number of murders during his life, and he did commission a purpose-built “Murder Castle” for the sake of these crimes. The con artist’s contradictory s of his own life, as well as the pacing of Larson’s The Devil in the White City, ensure that DiCaprio and Scorsese’s series could have been a deeply unsettling horror story. Holmes’s terrifying legacy was captured in the book, but Killers of the Flower Moon ended up becoming the only serial killer biopic that DiCaprio and Scorsese would collaborate on.
What Happened To Scorsese & DiCaprio's The Devil In The White City?
The Devil in the White City went from being a movie directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio to a TV show, which would have seen Keanu Reeves take on the lead role. That project has since been abandoned and nothing is happening with The Devil in the White City now. Reeves is no longer up for the role of H. H. Holmes and, although Tar director Todd Field was attached to direct the first two episodes of the show, he is no longer involved in the series either. However, Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio may still be attached as executive producers if the project ever happens.
