Michael Bay‘s $25 million weight-lifting heist/kidnapping film Pain and Gain is putting together an impressive cast. Now add one more: Anthony Mackie. He joins the likes of Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, Ed Harris, John Turturro and Rob Corddry in this tale of weight-lifting, drug-addicted criminals and those out to catch them.
Mackie will play Wahlberg’s Daniel Lugo’s right hand man Adrian Doorbal, the “third lead” in the film [Variety].
Based on a Miami New Times article from 1994, the real-life story was adapted for the screen by Stephen McFeely and Christopher Markus, the scribes who gave us Captain America last year.
Harris, not surprisingly, will play a private detective out to catch the thieves while Corddry will play the down-and-out gym owner who’s general lack of business sense leads to him to hire and trust the scummy Lugo.
Since his impressive turn as the second lead in The Hurt Locker, Mackie has been steadily making waves as one of the next potential movie stars to watch out for. Last year he stole scenes from Matt Damon in The Adjustment Bureau and Hugh Jackman in Real Steel and has plans to do the same from Ryan Gosling in this year’s mob flick The Gangster Squad.
Production on Pain and Gain is expected to begin in early spring.