JFK assassination film brings murderers’ row of actors to town
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 06/02/2025 (609 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
A film purporting to tell the inside story of the assassination of U.S. president John F. Kennedy is likely heading to Winnipeg in May with an impressive cast that includes John Travolta (Pulp Fiction), Michael Sheen (Frost/Nixon), Mandy Patinkin (The Princess Bride) and Dermot Mulroney (My Best Friend’s Wedding).
November 1963: The Killing of a President, will be directed by Roland Joffe, who was twice nominated for Oscars for his work on The Killing Fields (1985) and The Mission (1987).
Perhaps the most noteworthy name on the credits is screenwriter Nicholas Celozzi, the nephew of notorious Chicago Mob boss Sam Giancana.
From left: John Travolta, Mandy Patinkin and Michael Sheen will be in town in May filming November 1963: The Killing of a President.
The story is based on the eyewitness account of Giancana’s brother Joseph (Pepe) Giancana, who was with Sam during the two days preceding the 1963 assassination. The film reportedly tells the story of how Sam Giancana helped engineer the assassination as payback for the president and his brother Robert Kennedy launching a war on organized crime after the Mob helped put JFK in the White House.
Celozzi’s previous credits include being co-writer and producer of the 2011 feature documentary Momo: The Sam Giancana Story.
According to a Variety story published in May of last year, the film had been planned with David Mamet assigned to co-write and direct with stars including Travolta, Al Pacino and Viggo Mortensen, but that did not come to fruition.
“My uncle and I were very close when I was a little, little kid,” Celozzi told Variety.
“I’m staying with his story, as opposed to adding my own interpretation. I wrote everything down and just relaying his story. And that’s the screenplay that I wrote.”
The last major film to explore the assassination was Oliver Stone’s JFK (1991), which attempted to thoroughly debunk the account of the events as laid out in the Warren Commission Report. That film left the American public with a distrust of the official story.
“This film is a passing down family legacy by reciting history as told to me by Sam’s brother, Pepe Giancana,” Celozzi told Variety. “There are lots of theories out there about who killed JFK, and I just wanted to set the record straight.
“We are simply laying out the facts, for better or worse. The Outfit in Chicago thought they would never pull it off.”
Of the announced cast, only Mulroney has worked here before on the 2018 Bella Thorne film I Still See You.
Momo: The Sam Giancana Story is available to stream on Tubi.
randall.king.arts@gmail.com
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