Forest Whitaker to Executive Produce Biopic About Activist Angela Davis

Actor Forest Whitaker will serve as an Executive Producer on Angela Davis' upcoming biopic, Varietyreports. The movie rights were acquired to the book Angela Davis: An Autobiography last year by Codeblack Films, which was created as a division of Lionsgate in 2012 to provide better film representation to the worldwide black community.

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73-year-old Davis is one of the most important activists in history, having risen to prominence as a central figure in the Civil Rights Movement of the '60s. She made the FBI's "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" list in 1970 after being linked to the death of a Supreme Court judge in California, a crime for which she was acquitted two years later.

Davis came out as a lesbian to Out in 1997

She will serve as an Executive Producer herself on the film, as will her niece Eisa, whose play Bulrusher was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Fruitvale Station's Nina Yang Bongiovi, Codeblack CEO Jeff Clanagan, and Free Angela and All Political Prisoners' Sidra Smith are also attached.

Whitaker was last seen in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and Arrival, and will next appear in Finding Steve McQueen, Labyrinth, and Black Panther.