MICKEY Rourke is perfect to play a sadistic Mafia hit man who murdered more than 200 people says Phil Carlo, author of “The Ice Man.”
“He’s really looking forward to being the Ice Man, and I think he’ll do a great job,” Carlo told Page Six yesterday. “He’s talking about it being his ‘Raging Bull.’ ”
Hollywood producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura had the movie rights to the 2006 best seller about Richard Kuklinski, but his option expired in August, and Carlo wouldn’t extend the deal because Di Bonaventura — producer of “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” and the upcoming Angelina Jolie thriller “Salt” — wanted Channing Tatum in the title role.
Carlo told us at the time, “I think Mickey Rourke would really be good. He’s got that sense of danger . . . But it’s not Channing Tatum.”
After our story appeared in August, Rourke met with Carlo. “We hit it off beautifully,” Carlo said. “We’re producing it together. We’ll shoot in the spring in New York, New Jersey and Florida.”
Just for the fun of it, Kuklinski killed 50 vagrants under the West Side Highway before he was 18. “Because it was bums, the police had no idea there was a serial killer on the loose,” said Carlo. Then, Kuklinski turned pro and claimed 150 more victims for the Gambino family, using guns, knives, strangulation and poison.
“He used to use cobblestones, but he was getting gray matter on his clothes, so he stopped,” Carlo said. Kuklinski was arrested in 1986 and died in jail 20 years later, supposedly of natural causes. Carlo says he was murdered by Sammy “the Bull” Gravano.
Carlo launches his next true-crime tale, “The Butcher: Anatomy of a Mafia Psychopath” (HarperCollins), about Bonanno crime family killer Tommy Pitera, tomorrow at Locanda Verde in the Greenwich Hotel.