Continuing his ascent as one of Hollywood’s go-to lead actors, Mark Wahlberg is set to star as an international drug dealer in a still untitled film based on real events for Hancock’s Peter Berg. The drug dealer in question is Jon Roberts, who a few of you may have seen in the shockingly good ‘06 documentary Cocaine Cowboys. Roberts operated a few clubs in New York, did a successful stint in Vietnam and soon after migrated to Miami where he became a top domestic distributor for the notorious Medellin cocaine cartel. His power and notoriety reached a level where he could pay off the Miami PD to shut down causeways and race cars, and other madness only seen in the visions of Rockstar Games. He later did a decade in prison. Wahlberg is currently filming Peter Jackson’s The Lovely Bones, followed by Darren Aronofsky’s The Fighter alongside Brad Pitt, and you’ll see him next on screen in M. Night Shyamalan’s The Happening. Dream a little dream, right?

It’s fascinating to me to see drug dealers become immortalized more and more with their very own Hollywood films. Now, Pablo Escobar is one thing, as anyone who’s read Killing Pablo (in development) can attest. He helped start one of the longest world wars of all time, the so-called War on Drugs. Then there’s George Jung, who had the luck of having Johnny Depp play him in Blow even though he looked more like Pizza the Hut. It’s debated that Jung introduced America to its billion dollar love affair with cocaine.

Most recently, we saw the life of ex-heroin dealer Frank Lucas in American Gangster, and watched the real guy brag to any outlet that would listen that Denzel Washington bought him a large house in appreciation for such a great role. And then Jay-Z got the urge to make a new bestselling album inspired by Lucas and the film. I’m not going to lie, I thought American Gangster was ethically questionable, basically attempting to mold an important historical figure out of foul air. And perhaps the dudes in Entourage would have been better off bringing the life story of the Ramones to the big screen, instead?

How do you feel about the new drug dealer biopic trend?

Source Link: Variety