Ava DuVernay to direct adaptation of Isabel Wilkerson's 'Caste' for Netflix

Acclaimed filmmaker Ava DuVernay (who was behind such powerful films asWhen They See Us, a miniseries about the wrongful convictions in the Central Park jogger case, and 13th, a documentary about how the 13th amendment led to mass incarceration) will write, direct and produce a feature film adaptation of Isabel Wilkerson‘s 2020 book and New York Times best-seller, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. The film will simply be titled Caste and will use a multiple storyline structure to examine the “unspoken system that has shaped America and chronicles how our lives today are defined by a hierarchy of human divisions dating back generations.”

Caste, which was published in August, was an Oprah’s Book Club selection. Here’s the book synopsis:

Beyond race or class, our lives are defined by a powerful, unspoken system of divisions. In Caste, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson gives an astounding portrait of this hidden phenomenon. Linking America, India and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson reveals how our world has been shaped by caste – and how its rigid, arbitrary hierarchies still divide us today.

With clear-sighted rigour, Wilkerson unearths the eight pillars that connect caste systems across civilizations, and demonstrates how our own era of intensifying conflict and upheaval has arisen as a consequence of caste. Weaving in stories of real people, she shows how its insidious undertow emerges every day; she documents its surprising health costs; and she explores its effects on culture and politics. Finally, Wilkerson points forward to the ways we can – and must – move beyond its artificial divisions, towards our common humanity.

Before Caste, DuVernay has Colin in Black & White, a limited series about political activist and former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick. Release date for that has not been announced yet; stay tuned.