Yahoo Lifestyle Ava DuVernay Wants To Make A TV Series About Tom Bradley
EXCLUSIVE: Selma filmmaker Ava DuVernay is hoping to make a television series about Los Angeles’ first Black mayor, Tom Bradley.
DuVernay would like to adapt an upcoming book by The Tipping Point author Malcolm Gladwell on the city’s longest serving mayor, who was in charge of the city between 1973 and 1993.
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DuVernay revealed her desire on Gladwell’s new podcast, which he is launching with Black-ish creator Kenya Barris.
The duo are launching The Unusual Suspects with Kenya Barris and Malcolm Gladwell tomorrow via Audible. The podcast interview series sees them speak to extraordinary individuals from entertainment, sports, business and politics about their distinct paths to success.
DuVernay, who is behind series such as Netflix’s When They See Us and OWN’s Queen Sugar, was a guest on the podcast.
“I’ve been working on this book about Tom Bradley,” said Gladwell.
“I know you have and I’ve been tracking that thing. I’m just gonna say on this podcast, You need to let me make that into a limited series. That’s mine,” DuVernay replied.
Bradley was the first liberal mayor of LA and only the second Black mayor in the U.S. after Kenneth A. Gibson in Newark. His coalition transformed the city from a conservative, white-dominated city to a liberal multiracial one and he appointed more women and people of color to political positions than all of his predecessors combined. His main political opponent was Daryl Gates, Chief of the LAPD, who was at odds with him over budget cuts among other things. Gates resigned shortly after the 1992 riots and Bradley retired in 1993.
“[Bradley] is interesting… because he’s a man who was not permitted any freedom. He had to hold in every single feeling he had about the way he was being treated and all around him are people like Daryl Gates, his great antagonist, who was a white guy who was venerated for just being ‘authentic’. He could say whatever the hell he wanted to, and that was like part of why people love Daryl Gates. Tom Bradley could never say whatever the hell he wanted to, right? That idea that the two principal figures in a city for 20 years… one guy was never permitted to be himself, and one guy was venerated for being himself,” said Gladwell.
DuVernay said she knew there was a TV series in Gladwell’s book as soon as she heard about it.
“That is either an ongoing series or a limited series. I don’t know how long you span, but through the course of his tenure – first of all, incredible story – it’s basically the story of Los Angeles. That’s how I would do it, right? It was the story of Los Angeles through the eyes of Bradley, through his life and his career. Then you have Gates there. You need someone who’s, felt the Ghetto Bird going overhead. You’ve got to have someone from LA. You have to have someone who has experience with doing these incredible, in depth, dramatic pieces. I don’t know who else you’re looking at. I’m just telling you. I’m making my pitch right now,” she added.
The Unusual Suspects with Kenya Barris and Malcolm Gladwell will also feature conversations from the likes of Jimmy Kimmel, basketball legend Sue Bird, Dr. Dre, Wes Moore, the first Black governor of Maryland, Momofuku founder David Chang and Ursula Burns, the first Black woman to lead a Fortune 500 company, serving as CEO of Xerox from 2009 to 2016,
The series is produced by Barris’ Khalabo Ink Society, which has a development deal with Amazon-owned Audible.
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