Colin Farrell to reprise The Penguin role in new ‘The Batman’ spin-off TV series
The actor is getting his own TV show that will focus on the iconic Batman villain
Colin Farrell will reprise his role as The Penguin from ‘The Batman’ in a new spin-off TV series that’s been green-lit by HBO Max.
The Irish actor will executive produce the new series alongside ‘The Batman‘ director Matt Reeves as well as producers Dylan Clark and Lauren LeFranc.
The news was revealed in a a social media post by HBO Max on Wednesday (March 9). “Every story has a beginning. @DCComics The Penguin (working title), a new Max Originals limited series starring Colin Farrell, is coming to HBO Max,” the post read.
Producer Lauren LeFranc later tweeted: “Honoured and excited. This is gonna be wild!”
The Penguin is one of the most iconic villains from the Batman comic books and is usually illustrated as wearing a top hat and a monocle. He also has a collection of deadly umbrellas.
In ‘The Batman’ Farrell wears heavy prosthetics that render him unrecognisable. He said in an interview with Empire last year that he took inspiration from Fredo in ‘The Godfather’ (1972), whom he says has a”fracture” at his core like The Penguin (Oswald Cobblepot).
“[Reeves] mentioned Fredo to me because Fredo’s crippled by the insignificance that he lives within, in a family that is full of very strong, very bright, very capable, very violent men. Which is why he commits the act of betrayal that he does, because he’s weak, he’s kind of broken, and he’s in pain.
“There is a kind of fracture at the core of Oz, which fuels his desire and his ambition to rise within this criminal cabal. Where that rise goes… I would love to get to explore that in the second film, if that was ever to happen,” Farrell said.
According to initial reports to MRC Data, in the first four days of movie’s release the song earned 3.1 million on-demand streams in the US.
The figure is up from 372,000 on-demand US streams from the previous four days (February 28 through to March 3), which is a 734 per cent increase over the given period [per Billboard].