Liam Neeson is set to play a leading role in Martin Scorsese’s next, the long-awaited Silence. Deadline reports that the Taken star will headline opposite the previously-attached Andrew Garfield and Ken Watanabe.
Based on the Shusaku Endo novel (adapted for the screen by Jay Cocks), Silence is set in the 17th century and follows two Jesuit priests as they face violence and persecution when they travel to Japan to locate their mentor and to spread the gospel of Christianity.
2014 is a busy year for Neeson. He next lends his voice to The LEGO Movie, re-teams with Unknown director Jaume Collet-Serra for Non-Stop, headlines writer-director Scott Frank’s A Walk Among the Tombstones and plays the lead villain in Seth MacFarlane’s western comedy A Million Ways to Die in the West.
Production on Silence is slated to begin in Taiwan later this year.
