Starz has snapped up the Shawn Rech-directed documentary White Boy about 17-year-old Richard Wershe, Jr. who ran a sophisticated underground cocaine operation throughout Detroit and doubled as an FBI informant.
Arrested as a teen and sentenced to life without parole, Wershe remains imprisoned 30 years later and is the subject of this weekend’s Studio 8/Sony release White Boy Rick starring Matthew McConaughey. The pic recently made its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival and went on to play TIFF last Friday.
Matt Burke at Submarine Entertainment negotiated the deal on behalf of the filmmakers.
Rech interviewed journalists, police, FBI agents and hit men to set the record straight on the White Boy Rick urban legend. The doc will premiere on Starz in the spring and while air the Studio 8 movie in the summer.
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