Black Lives Matter leader Patrisse Cullors secretly dumped from TV deal

Warner Bros Television Group secretly ended a multi-platform deal with Patrisse Cullors, the former leader of Black Lives Matter, The Post has learned.

The Post can reveal no shows were produced under the deal, despite Cullors saying she planned dramas, comedies, documentary series and animated programming for children.

“The studio signed an overall deal with BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors at some point in 2020,” said a source familiar with the studio’s contract negotiations Friday.

“Deal expired at end of October 2022.

“The deal unfortunately did not result in any produced shows.”

The multi-year agreement was to develop and produce original programming to include black stories across streaming, cable and broadcast platforms.

It encompassed animated and children’s content as well as scripted and unscripted series, according to Variety, which reported on the deal in October 2020.

Cullors had said she was engaged in documentaries and scripted TV shows with Warner Bros. But nothing was ever aired and her contract was not renewed in October 2022.
ABC via Getty Images

The agreement was meant to draw on Cullors’ experience as a leader of the movement which started in the courtyard of her Los Angeles home in 2013, according to a statement from the studio at the time.

The value of the deal was not disclosed at the time, Variety reported.

A spokeswoman for Warner Bros, now part of Warner Bros. Discovery, declined comment Friday.

Cullors did not respond to requests for comment.

The end of her contract in October 2022 was in stark contrast to an interview she gave to The Hollywood Reporter in January of that year.


Cullors home Topanga Canyon
This is the Topanga Canyon home Cullors bought for $1.4 million a year after signing her Warner Bros. deal.
BACKGRID

She said that she was working on documentaries on how the idea of “landback” — in which Native Americans have former tribal lands returned — could work as reparations. Another was on black social mobility in the US.

Cullors also said she was working on a scripted project about marijuana, and others on female black leaders and what she called “the toll” of life “under a system that doesn’t see us, or makes us hyper-visible and also hyper-invisible at the same time.”

Cullors, 39, an artist and activist, resigned from Black Lives Matter in May 2021, a month after The Post reported that she had gone on a $3.2 million real estate shopping spree, buying up properties in California and in Georgia.


Warner Bros studio lot
Warner Bros. Television, based at the famous Warner Bros. lot in Burbank, CA, never aired a second of work by Cullors.
GC Images

She said at the time that she did not use any of the non-profit’s cash to make the purchases, and that she was resigning to focus on a book and TV deal.

“I’ve created the infrastructure and the support, and the necessary bones and foundation, so that I can leave,” Cullors said, adding that her departure had been in the works for a while and was not tied to what she described as “right-wing attacks that tried to discredit my character.”

A year after signing the deal with Warner Bros, Cullors bought a sprawling 2,500-square-foot home in Los Angeles’ Topanga Canyon in 2021 for $1.4 million, public records show.


Patrisse Cullors Alicia Garza and Melina Abdullah.
Cullors (left) co-founded Black Lives Matters with Alicia Garza and Melina Abdullah.
Patrisse Cullors /YouTube

Last year, she spent tens of thousands to install a fence around the property, and has lately began refocusing on art projects, with gallery shows opening in Los Angeles in the last few months, according to reports.

Cullors’ art work was recently featured in a show at a Los Angeles gallery.

Read the full article Here

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

DON’T MISS OUT!
Subscribe To Newsletter
Be the first to get latest updates and exclusive content straight to your email inbox.
Stay Updated
Give it a try, you can unsubscribe anytime.
close-link