Oscar-winner Jamie Foxx is set to produce and star in Amazon’s The Burial, with Maggie Betts on board to direct. Foxx joins the two-handed drama and will star opposite a legendary role currently being cast. Pulitzer Prize winner Doug Wright penned the screenplay.
Amazon Studios, Bobby Shriver Inc. and Double Nickel Entertainment are producing the upcoming off-kilter drama based on the New Yorker article by Jonathan Harr. Producers are Bobby Shriver and Double Nickel’s Adam Richman & Jenette Kahn. Datari Turner is also producing.
Based on a true story, after a bankrupt funeral homeowner decides to sue a rival businessman over a handshake deal gone wrong, the owner hires a flamboyant attorney to handle the case.
Foxx recently won at the NAACP Image Awards and received a SAG Award nomination for Just Mercy. He can currently be seen in Netflix’s Project Power, and will next be heard in Disney-Pixar’s Soul. Foxx is producing and set to star in They Cloned Tyrone, and is also executive producing and starring in Netflix’s father-daughter comedy series Dad Stop Embarrassing Me, based on his relationship with his oldest daughter Corinne Foxx, who also produces the series. Foxx is repped by CAA, LBI Entertainment and Ziffren Brittenham.
Betts wrote and directed Novitiate, which won the Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Director at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. She also received a Gotham Award nomination for the film. Her 2010 Tribeca Film Festival breakout documentary The Carrier tells the inspiring story of an HIV-positive and pregnant mother in Africa trying to protect her baby from being born with HIV/AIDS. Betts is repped by CAA, Brillstein Entertainment Partners and Sloane Offer Weber.
Wright has written more than10 plays, most notably the Broadway success I Am My Own Wife, which went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony for Best Play in 2004. Other Broadway titles include War Paint, Grey Gardens, Hands on a Hardbody and The Little Mermaid. He adapted his own play Quills for the 2000 movie, which was directed by Philip Kaufman and was nominated for three Oscars. Wright is represented by ICM Partners and Colden Law.
Source: Deadline
