Ava DuVernay’s untitled drama, starring and executive produced by Joshua Jackson and Lauren Ridloff, is not moving forward at Starz, PvNew has /confirm/ied.
The series had begun filming in Wilmington, N.C., in March but was paused in May due to the WGA strike. Starz decided not to move forward with the series following DuVernay’s decision to walk away after her overall deal with Warner Bros. TV came to an end in May. Additionally, Starz has been making multiple series changes; in September, the network axed “Heels,” “Run the World” and “Blindspotting.” Plus, “The Venery of Samantha Bird,” which began filming, paused during the WGA strike and is not continuing.
The DuVernay drama, which had received a three-season pickup, reunited Jackson and Ridloff, who co-starred in Broadway’s 2018 rendition of “Child of a Lesser God.”
The half-hour drama followed two polar opposites falling in love and battling daily challenges: “One person is ambitious, while the other is restless. One is ready to commit, while the other debates the merits of relationships. One is Black and one is white. One is deaf and one is not. Though wildly different, the two are emotionally and physically drawn to each other despite personal expectations and public assumptions. Their attraction passionately disrupts notions of race, gender, class, physical ability and normative culture, elevating to true love that surpasses difference.”
In March, Jackson spoke to PvNew about being drawn to the script and its simplicity.
“The question that the show is asking is, ‘Can you ever truly see another human being?’” He said, noting that he was determined to work with Ridloff again. “That’s why I chased Ava down and made her listen to this pitch. And I love that the deafness is not at the periphery of our story.”
