After Oscar-winning American Factory, three more Obama-produced Netflix film projects

Former US president Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama’s production company, Higher Ground, announced last year its first wave of content for Netflix, including documentary series and feature films.

The first of those projects, American Factory, directed by Julia Reichert and Steven Bognar, won the Oscar for best documentary feature on Sunday. Obama tweeted about the victory and congratulated the filmmakers.

“Congrats to Julia and Steven, the filmmakers behind American Factory, for telling such a complex, moving story about the very human consequences of wrenching economic change,” Obama said. “Glad to see two talented and downright good people take home the Oscar for Higher Ground’s first release.”

Netflix acquired American Factory at last year’s Sundance Film Festival and it is currently streaming. Netflix described the documentary as a “deep dive into a post-industrial Ohio, where a Chinese billionaire opens a new factory in the husk of an abandoned General Motors plant”.

Other projects in the works include a non-fiction series adaptation of Moneyball author Michael Lewis’ Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy, called Fifth Risk, and a film adaptation of Pulitzer Prize winner David W. Blight’s Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom.

Higher Ground said last year that the projects are in various stages of development and will be released over the next several years.

The Obamas struck a multi-year deal with Netflix in May in 2018 to produce original shows and movies. CNN reported that it was a “high eight-figure deal”.

“Barack and Michelle Obama are among the world’s most respected and highly recognised public figures and are uniquely positioned to discover and highlight stories of people who make a difference in their communities and strive to change the world for the better,” Ted Sarandos, Netflix’s content chief, said at the time.

The deal drew a conservative backlash from viewers who threatened to cancel their Netflix subscriptions. The streaming giant’s CEO, Reed Hastings, has also been critical of US President Donald Trump in the past, and supported Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election.

Below are three projects the Obamas are producing after Oscar winner American Factory, with details provided by Netflix:

Bloom

Netflix says: “Bloom is an upstairs/downstairs drama series set in the world of fashion in post-WWII New York that depicts barriers faced by women and by people of colour, in an era marked by hurdles but also tremendous progress.

Bloom is written and executive-produced by Academy Award winner Callie Khouri (Nashville, Thelma and Louise and the upcoming Aretha Franklin film at MGM), from an idea developed by Khouri, writer-director Clement Virgo (The Book Of Negroes, The Wire, Empire) and novelist and producer Juliana Maio (City of the Sun). Higher Ground Productions, Khouri, Virgo and Maio will executive-produce the series.”

Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom

Netflix says: “Higher Ground is producing a feature film adaptation of author David W. Blight’s Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, for which he won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in History. The New York Times called the book ‘an ambitious and empathetic biography of a major American life’.”

Overlooked

Netflix says: “Adapted from The New York Times’ ongoing obituary column Overlooked, telling the stories of remarkable people whose deaths were not reported by the newspaper, Higher Ground is developing Overlooked as a scripted anthology series with producers Liza Chasin of 3dot Productions and Joy Gorman Wettels of Anonymous Content.”