Cocaine Bear Director Elizabeth Banks Reflects On Working With The Late, Great Ray Liotta

Elizabeth Banks' upcoming movie "Cocaine Bear" is already a total fever dream, and it hasn't even come out yet. But the high octane thriller is highly anticipated, part of which is — aside from the fact that it's about a bear on cocaine — is that it contains legendary actor Ray Liotta's last on-screen performance following his passing earlier this year.

During a recent publicity event attended by /Film's Valerie Ettenhoffer, Banks opened up about her experience working with the iconic "Goodfellas" star. She said:

"Ray plays our drug kingpin, he plays Andrew Thorton's boss, basically. Andrew Thorton is the guy who throws the drugs out of the plane. And so, he wants to find the drugs. But one of the surprises of the script in this film is that one of the main scenes is parenting. You wouldn't know it from the trailer, but it's really about fathers and sons and fathers and daughters, people protecting their cubs. I really felt like that's what Ray brought, he brought a real warmth to this and he had a really great sense of humor about it, too."

Considering Liotta's film legacy, it makes total sense that he'd show up in a movie like "Cocaine Bear," and it makes even more sense that it would end up being the last part he played. Drug kingpins, mob bigwigs, these were the kind of roles he was known for. No, they weren't the only parts he played — hello, "Field of Dreams" — but after winning over viewers in "Goodfellas," he did get a bit typecast.

A film like "Cocaine Bear" also just seems like the kind of part that would've been up Liotta's alley personally. By all accounts — including Banks' during the event — he was a really funny and carefree guy who had a sense of humor that would lend itself to picking up a project like this. It's really sad not having him with us anymore, but it feels like a hilarious kind of poetic justice that this wacky, wild ride would be his final cinematic appearance. 

Liotta stars in the thriller alongside Keri Russell, O'Shea Jackson Jr., Aldrich Ehrenreich, Matthew Rhys, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, and Margo Martindale. Banks directs from a script written by Jimmy Warden. According to Deadline, the film is "a character-driven thriller inspired by true events that took place in Kentucky in 1985." It really goes to show that, a lot of the time, the truth can be stranger than fiction.

"Cocaine Bear" will arrive in theaters in the United States on February 23, 2023.