Jared Leto to play Hugh Hefner

Jared Leto is set to play Hugh Hefner in a Brett Ratner directed biopic about the Playboy founder. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the Oscar-winning star of Dallas Buyers Club and Suicide Squad will take on the role of the Playboy mogul after he told the Rush Hour filmmaker that he was keen to understand him. “Jared is an old friend. When he heard I got the rights to Hef’s story, he told me, ‘I want to play him. I want to understand him.’ And I really believe Jared can do it. He’s one of the great actors of today,” said Ratner, who is often tagged as one of Hollywood’s most successful filmmakers. “My goal is to do the motion picture as an event,” he added. However, talks of the Hefner biopic have been around for a while and there was hope that Leto would be able to meet Hefner but the meeting failed to take place before his death on 27 September. “There’s enough footage on Hef out there that Jared will be able to get as much information as he wants,” Brett said. The director is also planning to revive Hefner’s popular late 60s talk show Playboy After Dark. Leto’s latest sci-fi sequel Blade Runner 2049 is off to a flying start now. He is also set to reprise his role as The Joker in a recently announced spin-off of Suicide Squad.