Martin Scorsese is a restless director and producer, be it either in the case of award winning movies (Goodfellas – 1990, The Departed – 2006, Shutter Ireland – 2010) with an intricate plot and a great cast or in the case of well-chosen documentaries. Mick Jagger is not only the front-man of The Rolling Stones, he appears as producer along with The Departed’s director for an HBO ordered TV series on rock stardom and heavy life. The two names will be joined by Terence Winter, already a Scorsese recurrent (remember Boardwalk Empire).
The yet untitled documentary series is set in the New York of the 1970’s and proposes to ‘’explore the drug and sex fueled music business as punk and disco were breaking out, all through the eyes of a record executive trying to resurrect his label and find the next new sound’’. The already mentioned trio of Scorsese-Jagger-Winter will be in charge of directing (Scorsese), writing (Winter) and producing (Jagger, Scorese, Rick Yorn, George Mastras…). Bobby Cannavale (The Bone Collector – 1999, The Station Agent – 2003 or Chef – 2014) will play the major role of Richie Finestra, founder and president of American Century Records. Olivia Wilde (yes, I do mean the sexy and attractive doctor Thirteen of House TV Series) will become Devon Finestra, the New York model and wife of Richie Finestra. The cast includes other names like Juno Temple, Jack Quaid, Ray Romano or Emily Tremaine.
Although the HBO series is yet classified as ‘’ Untitled HBO/Rock ‘N’ Roll Project’’, IMDb Trivia attaches to it a rumored name: The Long Play. If the Scorsese-Jagger-Winter production will bear that exact name or not we are yet to find out, but one thing is sure, HBO has ordered it and it sticks to its choices, which seem to be quite ‘’musical’’ in the last period of time, the cable and satellite television network adding to its heritage Dave Grohl’s Sonic Highways, or Montage of Heck, a Kurt Cobain based documentary.