Taylor Kitsch joins American Assassin cast

Taylor Kitsch is the latest star to join new action thriller American Assassin.

The Michael Cuesta-directed film already boasts an impressive cast, with Michael Keaton and The Maze Runner star Dylan O'Brien also starring.

Kitsch is set to play the villain, while O'Brien takes on the heroic role of Mitch Rapp. Based on the bestselling book series by Vince Flynn, The Hollywood Reporter states filming will begin in September (16) on location in London and Budapest.

The film has a script by Stephen Schiff, and tells the story of Arab linguistics student Mitch joining the CIA as an assassin after his girlfriend is killed in a terrorist attack. Keaton will be playing Mitch’s reluctant mentor, with the pair chasing a mysterious operative intent on starting a world war in the Middle East.

The casting is a new avenue for Kitsch, who is best known for playing ladies man football player Tim Riggins on TV series Friday Night Lights and confused police officer Paul Woodrugh on series two of True Detective.

The 35-year-old previously spoke about how much he likes to play complex characters, explaining those are the moments he lives for as an actor.

“Yeah! I love diving into intense characters. That's why I also enjoyed working with Oliver Stone on Savages so much. I would have given anything to have played a couple of scenes with my character and Benicio (Del Toro)'s just in a room together. That would have been intense,” he said.

Kitsch has a further two films in production, Pieces and Granite Mountain, while Keaton is busy shooting Spider-Man: Homecoming. O'Brien has been keeping a lower profile after sustaining an injury on the set of the third Maze Runner flick, The Death Cure. A stunt went wrong causing a serious accident, leaving the 24-year-old with multiple broken bones. Earlier this month (Aug16), O'Brien was seen for the first time since the incident, popping into a juice bar in California and delighting his server, who happened to be a huge fan.