Star Trek Into Darkness and Sherlock star Benedict Cumberbatch has reportedly replaced Guy Pearce in Black Mass , a true crime drama starring Johnny Depp as notorious Boston mob boss James "Whitey" Bulger. The period film began shooting this week in Boston.

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According to The Boston Globe , Pearce dropped out of the film for unspecified reasons. (Update: Variety cites scheduling issues as the reason for Pearce's exit.) Cumberbatch is replacing him in the role of Billy Bulger, the gangster's younger brother who became the state's most powerful politician even as Whitey became Boston's most feared gangster. The Hollywood Reporter says Parks and Recreation's Adam Scott has also been cast in Black Mass. Scott will play FBI agent Robert Fitzpatrick, a veteran agent who pressured his fellow agents in the Boston FBI to close Whitey as a top-echelon informant but was rebuffed. Fitzpatrick later wrote a book about his experience and testified during Bulger's murder trial last year, but his credibility on the stand came under attack when some of his claims about his professional exploits were exposed as exaggerations.Black Mass is being directed by Scott Cooper. The cast also includes Joel Edgerton, Jesse Plemons, Dakota Johnson, Juno Temple, and Rory Cochrane.