When you’re making a fictional television series based around real events, a real time period, real individuals who did very real, very illegal things, you have a very thin line that you need to tiptoe across to make it work. Stick too rigidly to the historical record, and the characters can begin to feel trapped by events viewers already know about, but if you wander too far from it, it becomes something entirely made up. Thankfully, for us as viewers, MGM+’s The Westies has found room somewhere in the middle.
Although Stanley Morgan’s Mickey Flanagan and Tom Brittney’s Jimmy Roarke share their first names with two of the real gang’s most infamous figures, Morgan stresses that the series is not attempting to dramatize the lives of Mickey Featherstone and Jimmy Coonan directly. Instead, the colorful history of those real-life figures, along with those who occupied Hell’s Kitchen around that time, serves as a jumping-off point for the actors. Speaking exclusively with Collider, Morgan explained, “I don’t think it is a direct retelling of what went on. I think our story, Jimmy and Mickey, although they might share names with real people, have a very different relationship.” He continued, saying:
“In our story, these are two men who have known each other since they were children, which is different to the stories you’re talking about. But what I do think is that the raw materials that made up these people that you’ve read about are what make up our story as well — the essences of different stories and people who existed at this time. But it’s definitely not a biographical retelling of that story in particular. Of course, I read about those stories, and I read about lots of other stories in preparation, and I do think there are lots of those stories in the work of the actors in this.”
Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Survival Quiz Which Sci-Fi World Would You Survive? The Matrix · Mad Max · Blade Runner · Dune · Star Wars
Five universes. Five completely different ways the future went wrong — or sideways, or up in flames. Only one of them is the world your instincts were built for. Eight questions will figure out which dystopia, galaxy, or desert wasteland you’d actually make it out of alive.
💊The Matrix
🔥Mad Max
🌧️Blade Runner
🏜️Dune
🚀Star Wars
01
You sense something is deeply wrong with the world around you. What do you do? The first instinct is often the truest one.
02
In a world of scarcity, what resource do you guard most fiercely? What we protect reveals what we believe survival actually requires.
03
What kind of threat keeps you up at night? Fear is useful data — if you’re honest about what you’re actually afraid of.
04
How do you deal with authority you don’t trust? Every dystopia has a power structure. Your approach to it determines everything.
05
Which environment could you actually endure long-term? Survival isn’t just tactical — it’s physical, psychological, and very much about where you are.
06
Who do you want in your corner when things fall apart? The company you keep is the clearest signal of who you actually are.
07
Where do you draw the line — if you draw one at all? Every survivor eventually faces a moment that tests what they’re actually made of.
08
What would actually make survival worth it? Staying alive is one thing. Having a reason to is another.
Your Fate Has Been Calculated You’d Survive In…
Your answers point to the world your instincts were built for. This is the universe your temperament, your survival instincts, and your particular brand of stubbornness were made for.
The Resistance, Zion
The Matrix
You took the red pill a long time ago — probably before anyone offered it to you. You’re a systems thinker who can’t help but notice the seams in things.
You’re drawn to understanding how the system works before figuring out how to break it.
You’d find the Resistance, or it would find you — your instinct for spotting constructed realities is the machines’ worst nightmare.
You function best when you have access to information and the freedom to act on it.
The Matrix built an airtight prison. You’d be the one probing the walls for the door.
The Wasteland
Mad Max
The wasteland doesn’t reward the clever or the well-connected — it rewards those who are hard to kill and harder to break. That’s you.
You don’t need comfort, community, or a cause larger than the next horizon.
You need a vehicle, a clear threat, and enough fuel to outrun it — and you’re good at all three.
You are unsentimental enough to survive that world, and decent enough — just barely — to be something more than another raider.
In the wasteland, that distinction is everything.
Los Angeles, 2049
Blade Runner
You’d survive here because you know how to exist in moral grey areas without losing yourself completely.
You read people accurately, keep your circle small, and ask the questions others prefer not to answer.
In a city where humanity is a legal designation rather than a feeling, you hold onto something that keeps you functional.
You’re not a hero. But you’re not lost, either.
In Blade Runner’s world, that distinction is everything.
Arrakis
Dune
Arrakis is the most hostile environment in the known universe — and you are precisely the kind of person it rewards.
Patience, discipline, and political awareness are your core strengths — and on Arrakis, they’re survival tools.
You understand that the long game matters more than any single victory.
Others come to Dune and are consumed by it. You’d learn its logic and earn its respect.
In time, you wouldn’t just survive Arrakis — you’d begin to reshape it.
A Galaxy Far, Far Away
Star Wars
The galaxy far, far away is vast, loud, and in a constant state of violent political upheaval — and you wouldn’t have it any other way.
You find meaning in being part of something larger than yourself — a cause, a crew, a rebellion.
You’d gravitate toward the Rebellion, or the fringes, or whatever pocket of the galaxy still believes the Empire’s grip can be broken.
You fight — not because you have to, but because standing aside isn’t something you’re capable of.
In Star Wars, that willingness is what makes all the difference.
Who Were the Real Jimmy Coonan and Mickey Featherstone?
Coonan and Featherstone were two of the most important figures in the history of the Westies as an organization. While the series depicts both adapted characters at the start of their rise to power, the real story goes much further. Coonan emerged as the gang’s leader, while Featherstone became one of his most notorious enforcers and eventual second-in-command, a dynamic that you can already see building in the initial episodes of the series.
Their partnership did not end with the childhood loyalty depicted between Jimmy and Mickey in the MGM+ series, though. The pair eventually fell out, in part over the gang’s relationship with the Gambino crime family. After Featherstone was wrongly convicted of the 1985 murder of construction worker Michael Holly, he became a government informant. His cooperation and testimony helped prosecutors dismantle the organisation, while Coonan was ultimately convicted of racketeering and sentenced to 75 years in prison.
While those events may not be getting recreated beat for beat, Morgan said researching the real people and their experiences helped give the fictional world its weight, and that authenticity was strengthened by the level of detail he encountered when he stepped onto the production’s sets. “I did, yeah. I did at times,” Morgan said when asked whether the environment made him feel as though he had entered 1980s New York. “There were many times where I felt that. I think that’s everything I’m looking for as an actor, to feel that feeling and to feel like these are real experiences that are happening right now.” Mogan went on to praise the crew of the series, saying:
“And I think you get that when you work with the level of craftsmanship across the board on a production, and we really had that. I just remember all of the detail provided by the art department and the set decorators, right down to tiny little props that you would work with in a scene. Everything was thought about and looked into, and it just keeps you in that world. It keeps inspiring you and hitting you and making you really feel like you’re in that time and place.”
The Westies is streaming on MGM+ with new episodes on Sundays. Stay tuned at Collider for more.
