My Publicist Note Book

‘Black-Ish’ Spinoff Starring Yara Shahidi In Works At ABC From Kenya Barris & Larry Wilmore ABC  is looking to spin off its acclaimed family comedy  Black-ish . I’ve learned that the network is working with series creator/executive producer  Kenya Barris  and ABC Studios on the project, which would be toplined by  Black-ish  co-star  Yara Shahidi  and focus on her character Zoey Johnson in college. I hear the idea is for the potential new comedy series, created by Barris and former  Black-ish  showrunner Larry Wilmore, to be introduced as a backdoor pilot episode on  Black-ish  this spring. Sources stress that talks for the spinoff are still in very early stages, with no script and deals in place. Wilmore, who was executive producer/showrunner on  Black-ish  for the show’s first 13 episodes before leaving to topline his Comedy Central late-night show, recently returned to ABC Studios wit...

Creator Kenya Barris talks 'a very special episode' — and how it's inspired the writers Kenya Barris, the creator of ABC’s  black-ish , got the closest he promises he will ever come to “a very special episode” with last season’s half hour devoted to the uptick in gun violence in America. Titled “Hope,” the primarily single-scene episode featured a conversation between husband and wife Dre (Anthony Anderson) and Dr. Rainbow Johnson (Tracee Ellis Ross), their four children, and Dre’s parents (Laurence Fishburne and Jennifer Lewis) about the police brutality against black men and the resulting social unrest that has been playing out across the country. The episode stemmed, as most  black-ish  episodes do, from Barris’ home life. In the case of “Hope,” it was pulled from a conversation Barris had with his young son, who asked him why everyone is so angry. “The night it aired, I knew we tapped into something,” says Anderson in his trailer during a short break from...

It's a good day for Cowboy Curtis fans. ABC has greenlighted Black-ish, a single-camera comedy pilot starring Anthony Anderson. The project, which had a script commitment with penalty,  hails from ABC Studios,  Laurence Fishburne‘s Cinema Gypsy and Principato Young. Kenya Barris   Written by Kenya Barris (The Game) , loosely based on his personal experiences, Black-ish centers on an upper-middle-class black man (Anderson) who struggles to raise his children with some sense of cultural identity despite constant contradictions and obstacles coming from his liberal wife, old-school father, and his own assimilated, color-blind kids.  Cinema Gypsy’s Fishburne, his producing partner Helen Sugland and Tom Russo executive produce with Anderson and Barris along with PYE’s Peter Principato, Paul Young and Brian Dobbins.  There is no deal in place yet for Fishburne to act, but he had been open to doing guest appearances, and ...