The Milk team of Gus Van Sant and Dustin Lance Black are reuniting for another project that centers on gay rights. The two are reuniting for an eight-hour miniseries on ABC.
When We Rise will be about a group of LGBT men and women who helped the gay rights movement from the beginning through the successes of today. According to Deadline, the project has been in the works at ABC for two years before it received the greenlight on Monday.
The Hollywood Reporter notes that Black is writing, with Van Sant directing the first two-hour episode and executive producing. It comes from ABC Studios and will be executive produced by Laurence Mark and Milk’s Bruce Cohen.
Van Sant and Black had great success with 2009’s Milk, a biopic about Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man elected to a public office. Sean Penn won an Oscar for his performance and Black won Best Original Screenplay. Van Sant was nominated for Best Director and Cohen was nominated for Best Picture.
Van Sant most recently directed The Sea of Trees with Matthew McConaughey. Black’s most recent feature was Clint Eastwood’s J. Edgar.