If Shane Black has done his job as a writer and director, the legendary screenwriter who gave us "Lethal Weapon," "The Last Boy Scout," and "The Long Kiss Goodnight" (three of the greatest Hollywood action films made during the genre's blow-the-doors-off heyday) will launch a singular crime franchise with his new movie "Play Dirty." Black's film is based on the character of Parker, an unrepentant thief-killer created by Donald E. Westlake under the nom de plume of Richard Stark. The last name of the latter
author says it all; unlike the criminal mischief depicted in many of Westlake's books, Stark's Parker is a man of few words and zero remorse.
Parker abides by the simplest of codes: If we're working a job together, don't double cross me, and I won't kill you. Aside from that, he is fully committed to a life of thievery -- and while Stark stacks the deck just a tad by having him target only cruddy people, Parker almost never does solids. He just does his business and moves on to the next job. And Westlake/Stark thrives on the clarity of his amorality. When you dispense with the humanity and focus on simply, efficiently taking other people's money, the world is your dead-hearted oyster as an author. Every novel is a savage piece of reverse engineering: Get Parker up a tree, shoot bullets at him, and have him blast his way down.
I have read every Parker book, but I almost never recommend them to friends. I know many fans of crime fiction who find the character too bleak and too elusive. The plotting may be invigoratingly surgical, but these stories leave you with an icy kind of satisfaction. The odds get stacked sky high, but Parker wins because his blood runs colder than the other guy's. You know straightaway if that's your tempo.
This may sound like an odd fit for Black, whose pulp fiction is shot through with rough joviality, but I've spoken with him numerous times, and I know he adores the Parker novels. When he brought on Robert Downey Jr. to portray the protagonist, I was immediately drawn to the pairing (Black, after all, rescued Downey's post-imprisonment career by casting him in "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang"), but I didn't know if I could see the motormouthed star as a stoic killer. I have no idea what happened behind the scenes, but Downey bailed on the project, which led to the casting of another A-list star who's actually at his best when he doesn't talk all that much. Did Black find the man born to play Parker?
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Mark Wahlberg Might Be The Parker We've Been Waiting For
Mark Wahlberg is the strangest of movie stars. He came on as a soft, boyish lead in movies like "Boogie Nights," "The Big Hit," and "Three Kings," only to throw a dent into that image with his performances in "The Yards," "The Perfect Storm," and "Four Brothers." But I think he gave his finest performance to date as an emotionally distraught fireman in "I Heart Huckabees." Wahlberg, always a well-put-together fellow, sought out action stardom thereafter, but he still found time to challenge himself as a heartbroken father in Peter Jackson's "The Lovely Bones" (a role he took over from Ryan Gosling), a degenerate better in Rupert Wyatt's "The Gambler," and a childish himbo who lives with his speaking teddy bear in Seth MacFarlane's "Ted."
There was a Jason Statham path out there for Wahlberg, but he's turned it down at just about every turn. I was especially struck by his decision to play a bald, criminal oddball in Mel Gibson's "Flight Risk." We have an image of Wahlberg as a posturing meathead dating back to his days as the leader of the Funky Bunch, but he's often projected the opposite of this in movies. So maybe, opposite LaKeith Stanfield as Stark's silver-tongued Grofeld, he's ready for a true franchise role as Parker in Black's "Play Dirty."
There is some concern that Black, in reconfiguring the part of Parker for Downey, got too far down the road to course correct with Wahlberg (who is a better fit for the character as written by Stark), but the man who gave us "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang" and "The Nice Guys" is a nimble practitioner of the pulp arts. He knows how to make this kind of material sing like a whiskey-throated bluesman. Wahlberg, when he's just being Wahlberg (i.e. tough and terse), has the stuff to nail Parker. He's no Lee Marvin (who nailed the character in John Boorman's "Point Blank," an adaptation of "The Hunter"), but if he plays it close to the bone, he could match his pal Gibson's portrayal of Parker in Brian Helgeland's "Payback."
It's a tremendous opportunity for an actor who's never been the guy you expect. I think Wahlberg enjoys playing a badass, and he'll never get a better opportunity than playing Parker in "Play Dirty." We'll find out if he's pulled it off when the film hits Prime Video on October 1, 2025.
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