Leonardo DiCaprio in Talks to Star in Guillermo del Toro’s ‘Nightmare Alley’ (EXCLUSIVE)

By Justin Kroll

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Leonardo DiCaprio is in negotiations to star in Fox Searchlight’s “Nightmare Alley,” ’s follow-up to his Oscar-winning film “The Shape of Water.”

Del Toro will direct the pic and co-wrote the script with Kim Morgan. “” is being produced and financed by del Toro and J. Miles Dale with TSG Entertainment, with Fox Searchlight acquiring worldwide distribution rights to the film.

While there is a 1947 Fox pic, this film will be more based on the William Lindsay Gresham novel of the same name. The 1947 movie starred Tyrone Power as an ambitious young con-man who teams up with a female psychiatrist who is even more corrupt than he is. At first, they enjoy success fleecing people with their mentalist act, but then she turns the tables on him, out-manipulating the manipulator.

The film shoots this fall as del Toro fills out the remaining roles.

After “The Shape of Water” went on to win several Oscars, including best picture and director for del Toro, the auteur decided to hold off on picking his next directing gig, only focusing his efforts as a producer on the Searchlight movie “Antlers.”

DiCaprio has not been seen in a movie since his Oscar-winning performance in “The Revenant” in 2015, choosing to take some time off before signing on to star in Quentin Tarantino’s next film, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.” That pic, which also toplines Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie, and centers on the Manson family murders, bows on July 26.

He is repped by LBI Entertainment.