Al Pacino Reportedly Set to Play Joe Paterno in Penn State Scandal Film

Academy Award winner Al Pacino is reportedly attached to play Joe Paterno in a film about the late Penn State football coach and the child sex abuse scandal that engulfed the university, according to Deadline New York.

The film will be based on the new biography "Paterno," released last month by former Sports Illustrated writer Joe Posnanski. No director or screenwriter is attached yet to the project.

From Deadline:

The narrative arc of the movie that will be shopped is obvious. A man becomes the winningest coach in college football history and builds a powerhouse football program that turns him into a campus deity. When his former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky is revealed to be a pedophile and it comes out Paterno was told and helped hide the scandal, the coach was summarily fired. He died shortly after of cancer — and many feel of a broken heart — and the school had little choice but to raze a fabled statue of Paterno just as the NCAA dropped the hammer with sanctions against the school that included removal of Paterno’s wins going back to the cover-up.

Sandusky was convicted in June of sexually assaulting 10 boys and is currently in jail awaiting a potential life sentence.