Sienna Miller Cut From ‘Black Mass’ Despite ‘Fantastic’ Acting [Video]
Sienna Miller has been cut from the new Johnny Depp film Black Mass, the Boston Globe confirms. Despite being “fantastic,” it “came down to narrative choices” to leave scenes with Miller on the cutting room floor, explains Black Mass director Scott Cooper.
#SiennaMiller cut from @BlackMassMovie — director Scott Cooper confirms: http://t.co/r14Uz4wWqQ #MovieNews pic.twitter.com/15k2XyXEKY
— IMDb (@IMDb) September 4, 2015
Us Weekly reports that Sienna, who starred in American Sniper, played Catherine Greig, the real-life girlfriend of Whitey Bulger, in Black Mass. Whitey Bulger is played by Depp in Black Mass. Before Bulger’s arrest, Catherine Greig accompanied him for 16 years while he was on the lam from police. When Bulger was caught, Catherine was with him.
She eventually pleaded guilty to charges of harboring a fugitive and was sentenced to eight years in prison, according to Us Weekly. Bulger was sentenced to life for extortion, money laundering, and murder in 2013 and remains at the United States Penitentiary Coleman II in Sumterville, Florida.
Last July, Miller spent time in Massachusetts shooting scenes for Black Mass and even went to great lengths to get Greig’s Boston accent right, reports the Boston Globe. Miller said she had watched “every film ever set in South Boston: Good Will Hunting, Gone Baby Gone, The Town,” but her accent was lacking.
“Up until the day before I flew here, I couldn’t do it and it sounded stupid,” Sienna explained.
Miller worked with a dialect coach to polish her accent since, Sienna confessed, “Catherine had a thick accent,” and Miller wanted to “do it justice.”
Entertainment Tonight reports that the accent gave the British Sienna some trouble, and the “accent was something [Sienna] really focused on because playing someone from Southie, you don’t want to mess that up.”
Miller continued, “Hopefully I’ve managed to pull that off, although I think everyone’s like, ‘How can you be English and think you can do that?'”
In the end, director Scott Cooper decided that Black Mass would tell the story of Bulger’s gangster years, since the his years on the run were “less dramatic,” reports the Boston Globe. The decision made the scenes with Sienna Miller unnecessary.
Cooper confirmed, however, that Sienna was “fantastic,” and cutting her role had nothing to do with her acting ability. Cooper stressed that eliminating the scenes with Miller simply “came down to narrative choices,” reports Us Weekly. Black Mass has its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on Friday, reports the Boston Globe, and will be released in theaters September 18.
[Image credit: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images]
