‘Brother,’ ‘Black Ice’ Producers to Fasttrack Basketball-Themed Crime Drama Series ‘The Count’ This Fall (EXCLUSIVE)
variety.comJennie Punter Stoked by raves and strong receptions to their world-premiering Toronto festival films, “Brother” producers Damon D’Oliveira and Clement Virgo, “Black Ice” producer Vinay Virmani, and “Alice, Darling” producer Noah Segal are warming up a new basketball-themed crime series, “The Count,” for this fall’s marketplace, Variety has learned.
A modern spin on French author Alexandre Dumas’ classic 19th-century novel of wrongful imprisonment “The Count of Monte Cristo,” the TV drama will bounce between Toronto’s basketball milieu and Haiti’s cultural mélange as it follows the transformation of a Haitian basketball player facing a life sentence for murder into to justice-seeking saboteur.
D’Oliveira and Virgo under their Conquering Lion Pictures company, The Good Karma Company’s chief content officer Virmani, and Elevation Pictures co-president Segal have signed on as executive producers on the series.
Virgo, who wrote and directed the Lamar Johnson-starring “Brother,” and Hubert Davis, director of the revelatory hockey documentary “Black Ice,” are set to direct “The Count, which starts pre-production in 2023.
Read more on variety.com
