3 Martin Luther King projects in development

Deadline reports that Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Films is teaming with HBO for a 7-hour miniseries about Martin Luther King. Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Robert Schenkkan, who wrote four episodes of HBO‚Äôs The Pacific, will adapt the King series from three novels — Parting The Waters, Pillar of Fire, At Canaan‚Äôs Edge — by Taylor Branch, who himself won a Pulitzer for the first book in his trilogy.

The story notes that the HBO project puts Oprah in direct competition with Lee Daniels who’s close to finding financing for his own MLK drama, Selma.

A year ago Steven Spielberg and DreamWorks secured rights to film the life story of Martin Luther King, from a script being written by Oscar-winner Ronald Harwood (The Pianist).

Harpo Film’s Kate Forte describes the scope of the HBO miniseries:

This really is America in the King years, from 1954-68. Dr. King is the most dominant character, but there are so many other players who figure prominently. That includes his relationships with two presidents, JFK and Lyndon Johnson, his relationship with Coretta Scott King and his family, Bobby Kennedy, Stokely Carmichael and SNCC. This will cover the freedom rides, the Birmingham campaign, Selma, and the poor people’s march on Washington that he was organizing when he was killed. It will be the seminal Civil Rights era film.