Michael B. Jordan Re-Teaming With Ryan Coogler for Ta-Nehisi Coates-Scripted Cheating Scandal Drama
Michael B. Jordan and Ryan Coogler are teaming up for the fourth(!!!) time for Wrong Answer, a drama based on an absolutely nutso New York Times article about a standardized test cheating scandal that involved a number of Atlanta high school employees in 2014.
Deadline reports that the article, written by Rachel Aviv, will get the screenplay treatment from Ta-Nehisi Coates, who also writes the comic series that Coogler and Jordan’s current Black Panther movie is partly based on. Jordan will play Damanay Lewis, a math teacher at Parks Middle School near Atlanta who got involved in the biggest academic cheating scandal in American history when he and a number of other teachers realized their underpriveleged students weren’t getting the grades necessary to pass the standardized tests. During the No Child Left Behind program higher test scores in schools were institutionalized, but Lewis’ school, and many others, didn’t have the resources to catch up to avoid closing. So, he and a group of teachers decided to attempt to cheat the test.
Brad Pitt’s Plan B will produce the film with New Regency. Michael B. Jordan also has a Fahrenheit 451 adaptation lined up with Michael Shannon and Sofia Boutella.