May 28, 2019
Netflix Sets Michael Sugar’s Sugar23 Into Exclusive Multi-Year Series Deal
Netflix has set Michael Sugar’s Sugar23 in an exclusive, multi-year overall deal for scripted series programming. The deal also includes a first look for unscripted series. Sources said it’s an unusually rich deal for a non-writing producer.
It puts Sugar’s TV deal under the same roof as his feature deal, which was brokered last October. Sugar and head of production Ashley Zalta spearhead both divisions for Sugar23. It also comes after Sugar served as an exec producer on the Netflix series Maniac, which Cary Fukunaga directed and which starred Emma Stone, Jonah Hill and Justin Theroux.
Sugar also previously worked with Netflix on the series side on The OA, and 13 Reasons Why. In features, Sugar — who won an Oscar for producing Best Picture winner Spotlight — is a producer on the Steven Soderbergh-directed The Laundromat for Netflix, which stars Meryl Streep, Gary Oldman and Antonio Banderas. Among the percolating Sugar23 films at Netflix is an adaptation of Atlantic magazine’s Dr. Rapp, the story of 63-year-old doctor-turned-freestyle rapper that John Hamburg is writing to direct; a film adaptation of Erica Katz’s upcoming book The Boys’ Club; and an adaptation of Tell Me Everything with Leslye Headland writing to direct; and the film adaptation of Joe Hill’s short story Faun.