{"id":96689,"date":"2025-08-27T16:19:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-27T16:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/96689\/"},"modified":"2025-08-27T16:19:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-27T16:19:09","slug":"shane-black-on-bringing-parker-to-the-screen-in-play-dirty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/96689\/","title":{"rendered":"Shane Black On Bringing Parker To The Screen In Play Dirty"},"content":{"rendered":"

Never before has Parker, the professional thief of Donald E. Westlake\u2019s novels, officially made it to the big screen. Which is strange, since several of Westlake\u2019s Parker novels have, in fact, been adapted into movies \u2013 like John Boorman\u2019s 1967 Point Blank, John Flynn\u2019s 1973 The Outfit, and Brian Helgeland\u2019s 1999 Payback<\/a>. In all of those, the Parker role went under a different moniker, due to Westlake\u2019s insistence that the character only be properly named should a franchise of films arise. Enter Shane Black, whose Play Dirty is \u2013 at long last \u2013 giving us Parker. Even though this one, technically, is not directly based on any of Westlake\u2019s novels.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s fair to say that Black is a huge fan of the oeuvre, though. \u201cI used to say that if noir was a fine whiskey, Westlake\u2019s the stuff you\u2019d keep behind the bar,\u201d the filmmaker tells Empire. \u201cIt\u2019s the good stuff.\u201d His Parker is played by Mark Wahlberg, who stepped in shortly after Black\u2019s Kiss Kiss Bang Bang<\/a> alumnus Robert Downey Jr. passed on the project. Wahlberg had the right air that Black was looking for, in a story that sees Parker attempt to pull off a super high-stakes billion-dollar heist. \u201cHe wanted to play it straight and tough,\u201d says Black of Wahlberg\u2019s characterisation. \u201cIt\u2019s important that this be an edgy version of Parker.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whether or not Black continues to steer things, Westlake may finally get his wish for a string of Parker features. \u201cThere\u2019s a franchise there to be had, if someone wants it,\u201d Black says. \u201cI have other projects I\u2019d like to do on my own, just to write and see if anyone likes them. But I am not averse to a Parker sequel.\u201d Who fancies a couple of shots of the good stuff?<\/p>\n

\"Empire<\/p>\n

Read Empire\u2019s full Play Dirty story \u2013 talking to Shane Black about bringing Parker to the screen \u2013 in The Running Man issue<\/a>, on sale Thursday 28 August. Order a copy online here<\/a>. Play Dirty streams on Prime Video from 1 October.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Never before has Parker, the professional thief of Donald E. Westlake\u2019s novels, officially made it to the big…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":96690,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-96689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}