Following the success of the Oscar-nominated documentary “13th,” Ava DuVernay is teaming up with Netflix again for a limited dramatic series on the notorious Central Park Five case.
The streaming giant is planning on a 2019 release date for what will be a five-part scripted drama, with DuVernay serving as the creator, writer and director.
“The story of the men known as Central Park Five has riveted me for more than two decades,” DuVernay said in a statement. “In their journey, we witness five innocent young men of color who were met with injustice at every turn — from coerced confessions to unjust incarceration to public calls for their execution by the man who would go on to be the President of the United States.”
Each part of the series will focus on one of the five teens from Harlem — Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise — who were wrongly convicted in the attack of jogger Trisha Meili in 1989. The series will span from the spring of 1989, when the teens were first questioned in the case, to 2014, when they were exonerated and a settlement was reached with the city of New York.
President Donald Trump famously put out full-page ads in four New York papers two weeks after the teens were arrested in April 1989, calling for the teens to be executed. As recently as last fall, on the campaign trail, he professed his belief in their guilt in a statement to CNN.
DuVernay’s “13th” documentary explored race in the United States’ criminal justice system.
