The Penguin’s cast has continued to expand with Clancy Brown joining The Batman spin-off series as mob boss Salvatore Maroni.
Prime Video
HBO Max has added another big name to Colin Farrell-led The Penguin, with veteran star Clancy Brown joining the cast in the role of mob boss Salvatore Maroni. The first spin-off series from The Batman has officially kicked of filming, with the movie’s production designer sharing the first shot from the set on their Instagram account, and Brown’s casting is likely to be the last major name to be added to the production.
According to Variety, Brown will play the recurring role of Salvatore Maroni, who was mentioned but not seen the last year’s The Batman. The Dexter: New Blood star will join Colin Farrell, Cristin Milioti, Rhenzy Feliz, Michael Kelly, Shohreh Aghdashloo, and Deirdre O’Connell in the series, which is expected to hit HBO Max sometime in 2024.
The character of Maroni may not have been seen in this particular Batman timeline, but the collapse of the crime lord’s empire noted in The Batman is the sole reason Carmine Falcone was able to build his own empire in the movie. In turn, the death of Falcone in the movie is what then gives Farrell’s Penguin his own shot at the big time. Maroni has never been a constant presence in the on-screen world of Batman, but he did appear in Gotham, The Dark Knight and Batman Forever, played by David Zayas, Eric Roberts and Dennis Paladino respectively.
Related: HBO Max Exec Reveals Where The Penguin Series Fits in The Batman Universe Timeline
Will Robert Pattinson Appear In The Penguin Series?
Warner Bros. Pictures
According to recent reports, Robert Pattinson’s Batman will be making an appearance in The Penguin. Naturally, with the focus of the series being firmly on Farrell’s titular character’s attempts to become a criminal kingpin of Gotham, there will be limited screen time for Batman, or Bruce Wayne, but considering the shared universe being set up by Matt Reeves it will not be a particularly surprising cameo to see.
The Penguin will continue the story of Oswald Cobblepot, and could also help set up the events of The Batman Part II. One thing that is certain is that getting his own TV show was not something that Colin Farrell expected. He previously said:
“The only thing I had an idea was that I wasn’t nearly getting to explore the character as much as I wanted to. Because there was all this extraordinary work done by [makeup artists] Mike Marino and Mike Fontaine and his team, and I just thought it was the tip of the iceberg, pardon the pun, that we were getting to do the six or seven scenes that we did in the film. I was grateful for them, but I wanted more.”
Farrell also detailed what can be expected of the series, including revealed that the show will be an eight part series and will take place in close proximity to The Batman. He explained:
“It’s going to be an eight-part thing around Oz’s rise to power, filling that power vacuum created when Falcone was killed. Matt’s idea was to have the Penguin show begin about a week after the end of the Batman film. And if it works, if the trajectory is interesting, and the audience goes for it, and we do our jobs right, the second Penguin feature will pick up where the HBO show will end.”
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