Is this a Mickey take?

Mickey Rourke is no stranger to playing professional sportsmen on screen. He was, after all, a promising boxer in real life before portraying tough pugs in the movies (see Homeboy).

Then came perhaps his finest acting hour in the title tole of The Wrestler which earned him BAFTA and Golden Globe awards as well as an Oscar nomination.

For the last he was pipped at the final hurdle by Sean Penn playing a gay San Franciscan politician in Milk.

Now, though, this most macho of actors might get a chance to have the last laugh on two fronts - playing a sportsman and being gay with the news he's planning to play former Welsh rugby captain Gareth Thomas who bravely outed himself in a man's world.

There are rumours that Rourke, who will be 60 later this year, has had "work done" to make himself look more like the flying winger for a film to be shot later this year.

Quite whether he can transform himself into a thirtysomething Welsh rugby legend remains to be seen, but Rourke, already a recipient of considerable plastic surgery for earlier injuries, is nothing if not a trier.