Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way Productions has contacted Connecticut native John Scully, a former boxer and longtime trainer. Scully is training Band of Brothers actor James Madio to play Willie Pep, the late great featherweight champion who grew up in Hartford and Middletown. The Iceman, John Scully won Outstanding Boxer awards in 1987 and 1988 and then went pro in '88 and was inducted into the Connecticut Boxing Hall of Fame in 2010. 

According to the Hartford Courant, Scully was brought in to teach Madio how to look like a real fighter, act as a fighter, and mimic Willie Pep's technique, which focuses on footwork, and punches. The movie will be filmed in Hartford, where production has already begun.