After a fierce battle, MGM/UA Television has landed the rights to Rebecca Carroll‘s forthcoming memoir, Surviving the White Gaze.
According to Deadline, the book, which is slated to be released by Simon and Schuster on February 2, 2021, will be turned into a limited TV series, with Carroll serving as executive producer. For the past five years, Carroll has worked as a cultural critic and Editor of Special Projects for WNYC, a post that she will be leaving to pursue the new series, as well a number of other creative endeavors. She has also been a contributing writer for ESSENCE. Carroll profiled Kerry Washington in 2018.
The book and the series follow a deeply personal history of Carroll’s life, wherein she parses through identity as the only Black person growing up in her hometown. After she meets her birth mother, a White woman, her sense of self is rocked and she spends years of her adult life getting to the core of her being as a Black woman. Over time, with the help of her loved ones, Carroll is able to create a safe space within herself, once and for all.
The project was brought to MGM by Killer Films, an independent production company that signed a first-look film and television deal with MGM in May 2020. Killer Films’ founders, Christine Vachon and Pamela Koffler, will also come onboard as executive producers of the film.
Congratulations, Rebecca!