The First Pictures Of Al Pacino As Joe Paterno For An Upcoming HBO Movie Are Creepy AF

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When I heard that Al Pacino of all people was going to be playing disgraced former Penn State head coach Joe Paterno in a movie I wasn’t sure he was the right actor for that part. However, now that a couple of pictures of Pacino as Paterno have surfaced I am pretty creeped out by just how much Pacino looks like him.

Paterno, who was fired in 2011, a month after his assistant coach, serial rapist and child molester Jerry Sandusky was arrested, was later determined to have withheld information about Sandusky from Penn State officials.

Pacino, seen in New York below, filming the biopic being directed by Barry Levinson, will be playing the now infamous football coach in a film which chronicles Paterno’s story for HBO.

Variety reports…

The as-yet-untitled film centers on Joe Paterno, who, after becoming the winningest coach in college football history, is embroiled in Penn State’s Jerry Sandusky sexual abuse scandal, challenging his legacy and forcing him to face questions of institutional failure regarding the victims.

The film also stars Riley Keough as Sara Ganim, the 23-year-old journalist who first reported on the scandal, bringing it to the attention of the national media — and ultimately winning a Pulitzer Prize for her work. Annie Parisse will play Mary Kay Paterno, Joe Paterno’s daughter.

Here’s a side-by-side look at Pacino and Paterno to haunt your dreams tonight…

And here’s another look showing just how much Pacino has nailed Paterno’s look for the film…

This isn’t the first time in recent memory that Pacino has played someone infamous. He also portrayed Dr. Jack Kevorkian in the biopic You Don’t Know Jack…

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As well as Phil Spector in the mini-series Angels in America…

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Levinson was also the executive producer for both of those projects as well as the director on the Kevorkian biopic.