If anyone can sway Joe Pesci to hang up his retirement hat, Martin Scorsese can. It has now been confirmed that Pesci will join his Goodfella’s co-star Robert De Niro on the cast of Scorsese’s The Irishman.

Talks  reveal that Al Pacino is also close to finalising a deal while both Harvey Keitel and Bobby Cannavale are thrashing out a deal to jump on board the picture which focuses on the story of the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa, an American labour union leader and author who served as the President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Union from 1958 until 1971.

Adapted by Steve Zaillian from Charles Brandt’s no I Heard You Paint House, De Niro joins the cast as  Frank ‘The Irishman’ Sheeran, a mob hitman whose illustrious career is today best known for a supposed involvement in the death of Jimmy Hoffa.  Pesci will play Russell Bufalino, a Mafia boss out of Pennsylvania who has long been suspected of having a hand in the disappearance of Hoffa as well.

The Irishman

Filming is due to begin on the picture in August in New York until the end of the year.

The Irishman looks to be more of an Italian reunion of great actors, with Pesci, De Niro and Scorsese all having previously worked together numerous times in the past, in fact, The Irishman will be the seventh time Pesci and De Niro have worked together over their long and illustrious careers. If Pacino does sign on the dotted line surprisingly this will be the first project Scorsese and Pacino have worked together.

Scorsese, Gaston Pavlovich, Jane Rosenthal and Emma Tillinger Koskoff are expected to produce the production which is only expected to get a small theatrical release in order to be considered for an Academy Award.