Ava DuVernay, NBC developing Native American drama 'Sovereign'

Runningwater, the director of Sundance Institute's Native American and Indigenous Program, will head the project with Freeland and Bennett and be a co-exec producer along with Array's Sarah Bremner and Paul Garnes.

Director Ava DuVernay is creating a drama about a Native American family, a first for network television, set up at NBC. Titled "Sovereign", the potential series chronicles the lives, loves and loyalties of a sprawling Indigenous family struggling to control the future of their tribe against outside forces and themselves.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the project comes from DuVernay's production banner Array Filmworks and Warner Bros TV, where the "Selma" director has an overall deal. Writer-executive producer Sydney Freeland is a member of the Navajo Nation, and co-executive producer Bird Runningwater belongs to the Cheyenne and Mescalero Apache Tribal Nations, and grew up on the Mescalero Apache Reservation in New Mexico. Freeland and Shaz Bennett are writing the script from a story by DuVernay. All three will executive produce. Runningwater, the director of Sundance Institute's Native American and Indigenous Program, will head the project with Freeland and Bennett and be a co-exec producer along with Array's Sarah Bremner and Paul Garnes.