Is Mad Men’s Jared Harris taking on the role of Professor Moriarty in Sherlock Holmes 2?

UPDATE: The Wrap got a confirmation by Harris’ publicist that he will indeed be playing Moriarty. There ya go.

For the longest time it was being thrown around that Brad Pitt would be the actor to lock down the role of Professor Moriarty in Guy Ritchie’s SHERLOCK HOLMES sequel.

It was also rumored at one point that Gary Oldman or Daniel Day-Lewis could possibly nab the role. But did any of these actors actually get the part? Nope.

According to Latino Review, Jared Harris will slip into the role of the villain in the second installment of SHERLOCK HOLMES. Harris has managed to take on many different and interesting faces through his career. His most current face is that of Lane Pryce on MAD MEN. Harris has been in a ton of other films like THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON, IGBY GOES DOWN, HAPPINESS, and NATURAL BORN KILLERS to name a few.

In the first film, it was uncertain who Irene Adler’s (Rachel McAdams) mysterious employer was. Then later it was found out that this unnamed villain was in fact Moriarty. The character’s face was never seen and most figured it was Pitt. However, it was revealed that an actor by the name of Ed Tolputt was actually the one in the carriage.

This means Harris will join Stephen Fry who was cast just yesterday as Mycroft.