A miniseries on legendary crooner Sammy Davis Jr. is in the works from Lee Daniels Entertainment and Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman’s Playtone production banners.
The project, titled “Sammy,” is in its early stages, but its producers are considering basing it off Wil Haygood’s 2003 book “In Black and White: The Life of Sammy Davis Jr.”
Playtone has several Emmy-winning miniseries to its credit, including “Band Of Brothers,” “The Pacific,” “John Adams” and “Olive Kitteridge.”
This isn’t the first attempt at a Davis Jr. biopic — a project was announced at Paramount Pictures in 2018 with Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Lionel Richie and Mike Menchel, as well as Davis’ estate, signed on as producers.
Davis was an American singer, musician, dancer, actor, comedian and activist known for doing comedic impressions of celebrities. From a young age, he began his career in vaudeville with his father, Sammy Davis Sr., and the Will Mastin Trio. He was born in Harlem, and after serving in the military, he began recording albums and doing Broadway performances in the 1950s. He was a member of the Rat Pack with Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop, and appeared in Rat Pack films including “Ocean’s 11” and “Robin and the 7 Hoods.”
Davis died in 1990 at the age of 64.
Deadline was first to report the news.