Black Hollywood is hard at work.
After months of strikes and uncertain futures for television and film productions, several exciting projects are officially in the works. Whether return collabs from iconic legends or long-awaited sequels to classic franchises – or even exciting mystery projects from creators from other industries – Black creators are hard at work on tomorrow’s classics and cultural staples.
Take a look at some of the exciting projects that are currently in production in Hollywood.
Jay Z’s Roc Nation will reportedly take viewers inside one of the cornerstones of NY Hip Hop culture, the famed Entertainer’s Basketball Classic in Harlem, better known as the Rucker.
The multi-part documentary series will include never-before-seen footage of the annual tournament taking place in NY’s Rucker Park, and will open a new generation’s eyes to the link between basketball, Hip-Hop, and how Harlem helped shape the culture.
Already picking up buzz due to the casting of Ice Spice in her first-ever film role, Spike Lee’s latest joint is a revisit of Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 Japanese film by the same name and follows the story of a botched kidnapping and ransom demand that leaves a high-powered businessman in a moral dilemma that puts his fortune at risk.
This film marks the fifth creative collaboration between Spike Lee and Denzel Washington, and also features Academy Award nominee Jeffrey Wright in an as-yet-unspecified role.
A new sequel in the classic zombie apocalypse franchise 28 Days Later is set to go into production in three parts. Candyman (2022) and The Marvels director Nia DaCosta has been tapped to star in the second installment of the trilogy, taking a look at the fallout of the rage virus nearly three decades after the initial worldwide outbreak.
The rapper is collaborating with animated comedy kings Trey Parker and Matt Stone on what one Paramount Film exec calls “one of the funniest and most original scripts we’ve ever read.”
Set to be a live-action comedy, partially produced through Kendrick’s PGLang production imprint, the film will begin filming this summer for a July 4, 2025 release date.
This Peacock miniseries, featuring an A-list cast (Taraji P. Henson, Kevin Hart, Don Cheadle, Samuel L. Jackson, Chloe Bailey, Lori Harvey, Clifton Powell and Terrence Howard) dramatizes the real life robbery that took place at a 1970 post-fight party after Muhammad Ali’s comeback match in Atlanta.
