Comedy Based On Life Of Hasidic Rapper Nissim Black In Works At HBO Max From Salli Richardson-Whitfield & Moshe Kasher

Denise Petski
·2 min read
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

EXCLUSIVE: HBO Max is developing Motherland Bounce, a comedy based on the life of Hasidic hip-hop star Nissim Black, from writer/comedian Moshe Kasher and The Gilded Age executive producer/director Salli Richardson-Whitfield as part of her overall deal with HBO.

Created and written by Kasher with story by Black and directed by Richardson-Whitfield, Motherland Bounce is the story of Black’s spiritual quest as the former gangster rapper becomes the world’s first Black Chassidic Jewish hip hop star.

More from Deadline

Kasher and Black executive produce with Richardson-Whitfield via her HBO-based Early May Productions, and Erwin More. Eric Schulman and Aaron Fogelson serve as co-producers.

Black has in recent years become one of the most recognizable faces in Israeli hip-hop, his unlikely story starting in Seattle where he was selling drugs by the age of 12 and joined a gang shortly after that. His unique path to Orthodox Judaism and Israeli hip-pop stardom came after a confrontation with a rival nearly cost him his life and set him on a spiritual quest for answers that led him to Hasidism and a move to Jerusalem. His latest singles “Mothaland Bounce”, “The Hanukkah Song 2.0” and “Adored” have peaked at No. 4, No. 5 and No. 21 respectively on the Israeli charts. Black is repped by Aaron Fogelson and attorney Fred Toczek at Felker, Toczek, Suddleson, Abramson.

Richardson-Whitfield serves as executive producer and director on Julian Fellowes’ The Gilded Age, which has been renewed for a second season, and directed the final two episodes of the first season of Adam McKay’s Winning Time. Other directing credits include See, The Wheel of Time, and Altered Carbon. As an actress, Richardson-Whitfield has starred in films such as Antwone Fisher’s The Great White Hope and Francis Lawrence’s I Am Legend. Richardson-Whitfield is repped by More/Medavoy Management, Kaplan/Stahler, and Innovative Artists.

Kasher’s recent writing credits include HBO’s Betty and Apple TV+’s Little America, Netflix’s Wet Hot American Summer and Zoolander 2. On camera, he is known for Comedy Central’s Another Period, which he also wrote for; Problematic with Moshe Kasher, which he created; as well as The Endless Honeymoon Stand-Up Special on Netflix. He is also the author of the 2012 memoir Kasher In The Rye: The True Tale of a White Boy From Oakland Who Became a Drug Addict, Criminal, Mental Patient, and Then Turned 16, and the co-host of The Endless Honeymoon podcast. Kasher is repped by WME, 3 Arts and attorneys Karl Austen and Michael Auerbach.

Best of Deadline

Sign up for Deadline's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Click here to read the full article.