‘The Westies’ Chris Brancato & Michael Panes On Season 2 Potential

EXCLUSIVE: Chris Brancato and Michael Panes have the whole gangster soap opera of The Westies mapped out in their heads, and they’re banking on MGM+ handing them the keys to unlock the story.

Ahead of the Season 1 launch of the 1980s New York-set gangster drama series on July 12, the show’s creators told Deadline about they plan to build out the Westies world should the show reach a second season and beyond.

The series follows a fictionalized version of the Westies, a small Irish-American gang in the mid- to late-20th century whose ruthlessness and brutality gave them an outsized reputation. They both worked with and against the Italian crime families running crime in New York in the show and real life.

“Shows set in a period like this that transport you back in time are really all about the characters,” said Brancato, who is behind the likes of Narcos, Hotel Cocaine and Godfather of Harlem.

“One of the hardest things is to make the audience root for criminals. How do you do that? You put them in opposition to forces that are, frankly, even worse, so we’re rooting for the Westies to defeat the Italians and defeat the cops. Hopefully we’ve accomplished that and have made a show that people will want to watch for multiple seasons.”

Brancato, who has an ongoing development deal with MGM+, spoke about how his working relationship and friendship with MGM+’s Global Head, Michael Wright, had led to The Westies‘ development and revealed they are discussing further shows, likely in the crime genre.

“Michael Wright has been a friend and patron for years with Godfather of Harlem, Hotel Cocaine and this series, and we are cooking up a few additional shows for the future,” said Brancato. “He has been an amazing ally and always knows when to step in and give his thoughts about a series. He gives us an enormous amount of creative freedom, but at the same time you feel there is a grown adult in the seat who can help guide the show toward the proper specifications.

“I’m not at liberty to discuss what is coming up next, but we definitely have shows in the offing and we’re very confident there will be a second season of The Westies.”

Brancato was speaking to Deadline in the days before we broke the news Godfather of Harlem would end with a two-hour finale after four seasons on MGM+.

Brancato recalled how The Westies – which stars the likes of J.K. Simmons, Tom Brittney and Titus Welliver, was born out of a plan to feature the gang as antagonists in an upcoming season of Forest Whitaker crime drama Godfather of Harlem.

“On The Godfather of Harlem, we generally choose a group to oppose Forest Whitaker’s character, Bumpy Johnson,” said Brancato. “I was speaking with Michael Wright about Season 4 and said we should bring in the Westies. He stopped and said, ‘I would do a whole show about the Westies.’

“We realized we had an opportunity to do a show about a little-known Irish gang in New York City, which flourished from the 1960s through to the 1980s. We started in 1980 because we wanted to capture that period of time in New York City history.

“If you call of the Italian groups organized crime, the Westies were disorganized crime. There really were only about 20 of them, and they cut a wide swathe through New York. They were violent and brutal.

“They worked on behalf of the Italians, but they were also in conflict with the Italians, and we liked the idea of a group that is punching above its weight and had to survive a very fractious relationship not only with the Italians but internally, and there was a generational conflict that we have tried to depict. We felt they were ripe for the plucking.

“Their chaos and brutality was one of their strengths and also their self-destructive behavior made them a fascinating Greek tragedy figures in our minds,” added Panes. “We’re also talking about a New York City of the Fire of the Vanities, yuppies, cocaine flooding the market that also helps energize the generation.”

Brancato created the show with Panes, an actor and writer who has worked on Godfather of Harlem who he knew from their time at Brown University.

“I was doing mostly comedy writing and acting that some would have called comedic, not necessarily in a good way,” joked Panes. “Chris came to see some of my plays and we ended up working together because of that.”

“On the first season of Godfather of Harlem, Michael asked if he could have a crack at some scenes I was struggling with, and I realized this Jewish kid from Long Island could write gangster dialog as well as anyone I ever met,” added Brancato.

“I grew up around a plot of bickering,” explained Panes with a smile.

Recreating New York

Shooting on the series, which launches on MGM+ on July 29, took place in Toronto where the production design team built a huge 240-foot recreation of a New York street after realizing the modern Canadian city couldn’t double as 1980s America.

“When we scouted Toronto, we were looking for exteriors that might mimic 1980s New York, but you would have to paint out all the surveillance cameras and it didn’t quite look right,” said Brancato.

“Even the sidewalks didn’t pass for New York sidewalks,” added Panes. “Everything about Toronto is so idiosyncratic and changing all the time.”

“Our production designer, Rocco Matteo created this beautiful 240-foot New York City street circa 1980 with attendant churches, peep shows, bars, massage parlors, etcetera,” said Brancato. “We feel like we created a time capsule and I think the audience is going to like being transported to that period of time.”

The cast is led by Whiplash and Oz actor Simmons, who plays gang leader Eamonn Sweeney, and Brittney as James ‘Jimmy’ Roarke, with Welliver playing a different kind of cop to his principled Bosch character. The likes of Stanley Morgan and Sarah Bolger also feature.

“JK is in a class by himself when it comes to these type of tough guy roles,” said Brancato. “We got him the script early on and he agreed to be in it, and he was our first and only ask. He brings a certain gravitas and humor to his performance, and once you get a JK Simmons, other actors want to be involved; it’s a snowball effect. As a human being, he’s a wonderful person and not nearly as mean as he comes across on screen.”

Panes added praised Welliver’s performance as compromised cop Glenn Keenan as “the inverse of Bosch” and credited the younger cast for “standing up with JK and Titus very well.”

Brancato’s next move

Showrunner and writer Brancato is arguably best known for co-creating Netflix drug drama Narcos, for which he was responsible for the first season’s Pablo Escobar story. Quizzed if there was another iteration of Narcos, which has spawned a Mexico spin-off, in the offing, he replied in the negative.

“One could argue every single crime show [of mine] since Narcos is another iteration of Narcos,” he said. For sure, we have a few things cooking that are in the crime genre that will give Narcos a run for its money. I specifically attended to the Pablo Escobar portion of Narcos and that story is told, as far as I’m concerned.”

Panes, said of the idea: “After we populate Mars, maybe there will be a Narcos: Mars,” and turned back to The Westies, saying: “Stay tuned for season 2. It gets even crazier.”