Dave Chappelle to Executive Produce ‘Chappelle’s Home Team’ Comedy Specials at Netflix

EXCLUSIVE: Norman Lear and Brent Miller have boarded Mind Riot Entertainment’s as executive producers through their Act III Productions banner. The series is about journalist, game developer and computer programmer Brianna Wu’s experience as a critic and target of the notorious 2014 online harassment campaign. Gamergate is co-created and co-written by Wu and J. Brad Wilke.

EXCLUSIVE: This is a surprise. Demi Lovato, who had been attached as star in NBC’s multi-camera comedy pilot Hungry for a year, has stepped down from acting duties in the project just as it was about to start production. Lovato, along with their manager Scooter Braun, remain executive producers.

NBC has put in development Delia Graves and the Order of Merlin, a drama from Sleepy Hollow co-creator Phillip Iscove, Justin Lin and his Perfect Storm Entertainment and Universal Television, where Lin is under a deal.

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorRachel Brosnahan is set to star in and executive produce podcast drama series “Listening In,” in which she will play a woman whose home sound system inexplicably lets her eavesdrop on people living in her apartment building.Audio content studio QCode will finance and distribute the podcast, producing “Listening In” alongside Automatik and Brosnahan’s production banner, Scrap Paper Pictures. The eight-episode first season of the series is slated to debut this spring.

Mary J. Blige has re-teamed with Lifetime to executive produce Real Love, a new original film inspired by her hit ’90s song of the same name. Blige will executive produce via her Blue Butterfly production banner, alongside Ashaunna Ayars and Nicole Jackson.

Oscar and Emmy winner Barry Levinson has been tapped to direct David E. Kelley’s The Missing, Peacock’s eight-episode series based on Israeli crime writer Dror A. Mishani’s international bestselling novel The Missing File. Levinson will direct multiple episodes, including the first, and executive produce the series from Kelley, Keshet Studios and Universal Television

Joe Otterson TV ReporterCallum Greene and Sara Greene’s Bright Greene production banner has entered into a first-look deal with Amazon, Variety has learned.Callum is an executive producer on Amazon’s highly-anticipated TV series “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.” Under the deal, Bright Greene will develop and produce new projects for Amazon’s streaming platform. UTA brokered the deal on behalf of Bright Greene.\“After the epic journey of Season One we couldn’t be more excited to continue our work with Amazon,” said Callum Greene.

EXCLUSIVE: Revelations Entertainment’s Morgan Freeman and Lori McCreary have boarded Kamilla Blanche’s upcoming documentary 2 Richards! The African Company as EPs.

Netflix has received criticism from users after commissioning a series of specials for Dave Chappelle.The comedian received a big backlash last year over his stand-up special The Closer, where he described himself as “team TERF” as he spoke on the controversy surrounding J.K. Rowling.LGBTQ rights group GLAAD said that his “brand has become synonymous with ridiculing trans people and other marginalised communities,” while many more also spoke out. Some Netflix employees also staged a virtual walkout in protest over his comments.However, last week it was confirmed that the comedian will front four new specials called Chappelle’s Home Team, which will each feature a different comedian introduced by Chappelle.Following this news, many people have spoken out on social media, one writing: “Oh man.

Despite Dave Chappelle’s controversial past with Netflix, the comedian is coming back for more.

Dave Chappelle‘s relationship with Netflix is expanding.

Dave Chappelle will executive produce four new stand-alone comedy specials featuring comics personally selected by him as part of his Chappelle’s Home Team series for Netflix.

Manori Ravindran International EditorEntertainment One has hired Left Bank executive producer Sharon Hughff to serve as creative director of scripted television out of the U.K.In her new role, she will oversee the scripted team and pipeline from the U.K., while spearheading efforts to expand the slate into buyers in the U.K. as well as Europe and Asia.

Quiana Burns’s leadership role at Tamron Hall is becoming permanent. The Good Morning America Weekend executive producer joined the syndicated daytime talk show as interim executive producer in October, shortly after Tamron Hall moved from ABC Entertainment to ABC News where it is overseen by the team of ABC News President Kim Godwin. It was Godwin who announced Burns’ official appointment today.

Zoe Saldana is headed to Paramount+.

Joe Otterson TV ReporterABC has ordered a drama pilot from Kay Oyegun.In the untitled one-hour series, five therapists in Philadelphia find unique ways to solve problems in their patients’ lives while grappling with their own. Ellen Roman, the owner of the practice and a brilliant therapist, has her life shockingly turned upside down when she begins working with a sociopathic patient who may hold the key to the disappearance of her sister five years earlier.Oyegun will serve as the writer and executive producer on the pilot.

YELLOW SPRINGS, Ohio -- Comedian Dave Chappelle said his threat to pull the plug on his plans to open a comedy club near his hometown in Ohio wasn't because he opposed a proposal for affordable housing in a nearby development.Chappelle, who became the target of criticism this week after speaking against the development in Yellow Springs, said in a statement that the plan was not the right fit for the village.“Dave Chappelle didn’t kill affordable housing. Concerned residents and a responding Village Council ‘killed’ a half-baked plan which never actually offered affordable housing,” said Carla Sims, a spokesperson for Chappelle.Chappelle was among several residents who spoke against the project at a council meeting Monday the Dayton Daily News reported.The comedian, who announced last year that he was buying a former fire station in Yellow Springs with plans to turn it into a comedy club, said he would back out if the project was allowed.

EXCLUSIVE: Payman Benz (Black Monday) has been tapped to direct and serve as co-executive producer on four episodes, including the pilot, of Blockbuster, Netflix’s upcoming single-camera workplace comedy starring Randall Park.

opposing an affordable housing project in Yellow Springs, Ohio.Chappelle, 48, addressed the town council and threatened to pull his money from the community if they approved plans to develop 53 acres of residential housing.The town voted on the plan Wednesday after the council meeting, where the public was invited to comment on the proposal. Now, Chappelle is clearing things up. His reps didn’t respond to The Post’s request for comment, but in a statement to Fox News, his spokeswoman Carla Sims said the plan itself needed improvements.“Dave Chappelle didn’t kill affordable housing,” Sims said. “Concerned residents and a responding Village Council ‘killed’ a half-baked plan which never actually offered affordable housing.”In the viral clip, Chappelle, who lives in the town, can be heard calling local politicians “clowns.” He told the council, in no uncertain terms, that he would pull his own business ventures —  a planned restaurant and comedy club called the Firehouse Eatery — out of Yellow Springs.“I don’t know why the council would be afraid of litigation from a $24 million-a-year company while it’s out a $65 million-a-year company,” Chappelle told the Yellow Springs Village Council.