If you're going to create a series about sports on HBO, you could do worse than get Dwayne Johnson, who spent years executive producing and starring in Ballers, involved. And since this new show is also about wrestling... Well, that's a no-brainer.
That goes a long way to explain why Issa Rae – herself no stranger to the Stateside channel thanks to Insecure is teaming up with Johnson and his producing partner Dany Garcia for a show currently titled TRE CNT (which stands for TRE COUNT, in case anyone gets any rude ideas.
It's sprung from the mind if Mohamad El Masri, and will revolve around Cassius Jones, a young dock worker and struggling pro-wrestler, who uses inherited life-insurance money for start-up cash and the deed to a house from his grandfather to start a hip-hop centric backyard wrestling empire in Houston’s Third Ward (The Tre) with the help of his working-class family, neighbours, and friends.
It's early days for this one – the current world situation means it wouldn't shoot for a while even if it had scripts – but the early development can at least happen remotely. Whether Johnson would have a role in this one remains to be seen, though he was able to film Ballers in between his blockbusters.