Dianne Wiest, Michael Pena Join Clint Eastwood's 'The Mule' (Exclusive)

Eastwood is directing the project and is also starring, marking the first time since 2012’s 'Trouble With the Curve' that the veteran Hollywood star will appear onscreen.

Two-time Oscar winner Dianne Wiest and Michael Pena have joined Clint Eastwood and Bradley Cooper in Warner Bros.' crime drama The Mule.

Laurence Fishburne, Alison Eastwood, Taissa Farmiga and Ignacio Serricchio have also boarded the production, which began shooting Monday in Augusta, Georgia.

Eastwood is directing the project and is also starring, marking the first time since 2012’s Trouble With the Curve that the veteran Hollywood actor will appear onscreen.

The story, per the studio, focuses on Earl Stone, a man in his 80s who is broke, alone and facing foreclosure of his business when he is offered a job that simply requires him to drive. What he discovers is that he has just signed on as a drug courier for a Mexican cartel.

Stone does the job so well that his cargo increases exponentially, and he is assigned a handler. But he also comes on the radar of hard-charging DEA agent. And even as his money problems become a thing of the past, Stone’s past mistakes start to weigh heavily on him, and it’s uncertain if he’ll have time to right those wrongs before law enforcement, or the cartel’s enforcers, catch up to him.

Eastwood is playing Stone, while Cooper is a hard-charging DEA agent hot on his tail.

In what is said to be a meaty role, Wiest will play Stone’s ex-wife. Pena is the enforcer.

Nick Schenk, who wrote Eastwood’s Gran Torino, wrote the script.

Eastwood is producing along with his Malpaso cohorts Tim Moore, Kristina Rivera and Jessica MeierDan. Friedkin and Bradley Thomas of Imperative Entertainment (All the Money in the World) are also producing.

Dave Bernad, Ruben Fleischer and Todd Hoffman are exec producing. Imperative’s Jillian Apfelbaum is co-producing.

Wiest, repped by ICM Partners, is the veteran actress who won Academy Awards for Hannah and Her Sisters as well as Bullets Over Broadway, and was also nominated for an Oscar for her work in Ron Howard’s Parenthood (not to overlook her work in 1980s classic The Lost Boys). She currently stars in the CBS ensemble drama Life in Pieces.

Pena, who will appear in the next season of Narcos and recently starred in Warners' 12 Strong, next shows up on the big screen in Ant-Man and the Wasp. He is repped by CAA and Management 360.