Sydney Gallonde, the French producer of Make It Happen Studio, is set to re-team with MGM TV Intl. Productions on a biopic of Eugene Bullard, one of the first Black American military pilots who was also a boxer and a jazz musician.
Gallonde has acquired the book rights to Claude Ribbe’s biography of Bullard, which shed light on the man’s heroic life and drew headlines on French media across the country when it was published in 2012.
Like many Black American entertainers such as Josephine Baker, Bullard left America for Europe and France in 1914 to escape racial segregation, lynchings and prejudice. The young and adventurous man, who was born in Georgia, eventually settled in Paris looking for a better life and worked at a music hall. When WWI erupted, Bullard enlisted in France’s Foreign Legion along with other foreign volunteers, becoming one of the few Black combat pilots during the war. He then volunteered for the French Air Service and later became a flight fighter for the French Army.
After the war, he was awarded 14 medals, including the Croix de Guerre honor, which he received from the French government. Later on, when he returned to Paris, he owned and ran a popular jazz venue called “L’Escadrille” where he mingled with and befriended many artists and authors, including Baker, Louis Armstrong and Ernest Hemingway. When WWII began, Bullard, who also spoke German, was asked by the French government to spy on German guests who would turn up at his club venue. He eventually returned to America in 1940 after France was invaded by Nazi Germany.
Gallonde said this adaptation was a passion project that he’s been developing for three years. The French producer has been developing a treatment with Ribbe and is now in negotiations with a British award-winning screenwriter to come on board as a showrunner.
“Like Eugene Bullard, I have Native American Haitian and French Caribbean origins, and his story has inspired me because he was an outsider who overcame racial barriers and was always willing to embark on new challenges,” said Gallonde, who is one of France’s rare Black producers. “Eugene was not allowed to become a flight fighter for the U.S. army because he was Black. He used to say that ‘all blood runs red’ because he wanted everybody to understand that all men were equals regardless of their skin color.”
Gallonde pointed out that this biopic was precisely the type of project he wants to pursue with MGM because it’s organically set “between France and the U.S.” with elements from both cultures. “It will have drama and action with the depiction of the wars, and also glamour and jazz with Paris as a primary backdrop and many iconic figures as secondary roles,” said the producer.
The biopic will shoot in English and is being developed into a series — but it could also be turned into a period film.
Make it Happen and MGM Intl. TV Productions already partnered up on “Last Light,” an action thriller miniseries starring Matthew Fox (“Lost”) and adapted from Alex Scarrow’s bestselling novel; and “The Reunion,” adapted from Guillaume Musso’s “La jeune fille et la nuit,” a French Riviera-set mystery thriller premiering on Oct. 17 on France Televisions. Ludovic Attal, senior VP of production and finance strategy at MGM Intl. TV Productions, showed trailers for both “Last Light” and “The Reunion” during a presentation at Mipcom, alongside Gallonde.