Martin Scorsese and Nicholas Pileggi are revisiting their gangster classic "Goodfellas" for a prequel TV series about the early life of mobster Henry Hill. Rumors circulated in September that a TV version of the hit 1990 movie is in the works following the success of new U.S. crime drama "Boardwalk Empire", which launched earlier this year with a Scorsese-directed episode.

Now Pileggi - who wrote Wiseguy, the book on which Goodfellas is based, and worked on the film's screenplay with Scorsese - has confirmed he and the director are planning a TV series linked to the movie. The storyline is likely to focus on the early life of Hill, who was played by Ray Liotta in the film, as many of the characters in "Goodfellas" are dead by the end of the movie.

Pileggi tells Britain's Culture magazine, "We're trying (to develop the TV series). I want to do it, Marty wants to do it, Warner Bros wants to do it. Of course, you can't pick up from Goodfellas, since we murdered everybody, or rather, everybody was murdered! There's nobody left. But I think we're going to figure out a way to do the early years - sort of a prequel. The part of the movie people often like best is the opening third, where all the funny stuff is happening, and there's so much we could fit in."