Yahoo Lifestyle Brillstein Entertainment Inks Josh Wakely, Creator Of Beatles Music Toon Series ‘Beat Bugs’ & Grace Label
EXCLUSIVE: Brillstein Entertainment Partners has signed Australian writer-director-producer Josh Wakely in all areas.
An Emmy winner for his Netflix Original series Beat Bugs based on the music of the Beatles, which he also created and directed, and the originator of the upcoming Amazon series The Greatest based on the life story of Muhammad Ali, Wakely has gained a reputation for securing rights to some of the world’s most iconic music catalogues, life stories, and other premium IP for adaptation into film and television. Wakely secured the Beatles catalog for use in his animated kids TV series Beat Bugs from Sony, and he’s pulled off such feats with other popular musician estates. He recently secured the songs of Bob Dylan for a new dramatic series he’s developing based on the folk legend’s tunes throughout the decades. Dylan will serve as EP of that series.
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In addition, BEP will also represent Wakely’s venture-backed film and TV firm Grace, which operates from New York, Los Angeles and Sydney and is funded by investors including Alex Black’s Lyrical Media. Grace, whose growing team includes Derek Iger, EVP of Development & Production, focuses on adapting iconic IP to tell transformative and aspirational stories and is structured to allow company investors to also invest directly into Grace projects.
BEP will handle Wakely as a writer and director and will work with Grace to accelerate the development of the company’s existing IP and to support its high-level relationships, such as Wakely’s long-standing collaboration with Universal Music Group (UMG), which has to date generated multiple projects.
Wakely is currently in pre-production on an untitled music-themed science fiction feature set in the near future that Wakely will direct from his original screenplay. The fully financed film, budgeted at more than $20 million and set to shoot in Australia, is currently out to talent.
Wakely secured life rights to boxing legend Ali, then originated and developed over the course of three years the scripted series The Greatest, which is now headed into production at Amazon with Wakely serving as EP along with an all-star team assembled by Wakely, including Michael B. Jordan’s Outlier Society, Jay Z’s Roc Nation, Universal Music Group, and showrunner Ben Watkins.
Wakely created and also ran the Netflix series Motown Magic based on that record label’s catalog.
Wakely is represented by Craig Jacobson at Hansen Jacobson.
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