ViacomCBS’ MTV Entertainment Group is committing $250 million over the next three years to bring content from women and BIPOC-owned production companies to screens.
BIPOC is a new acronym, which stands for “black, indigenous and people of color.”
MTV Entertainment Group will spend $250 million funding these production companies, as well as providing them with production infrastructure, services, and staff, according to a report by Variety.
“As a former showrunner, this endeavor is something very close to my heart,” said MTV Entertainment president of content and chief creative officer Nina Diaz. “Having come up on the production side where this kind of pipeline didn’t exist, it is a great privilege to help launch a new generation of creative powerhouses into production ownership.”
The report added that producers Lashan Browning and Adam Gonzalez, who signed overall deals with MTV Studios, are being brought in to produce unscripted content and will create their own third-party production ventures with an equity investment from MTV Entertainment.
Last month, MTV Entertainment Group announced that it was teaming up with social justice groups, from Color of Change to GLAAD, to launch a “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DE&I) orientation initiative that will construct new “baseline cultural norms” across Viacom CBS’ brands.
Social justice groups like GLAAD have spent years blasting the entertainment industry for not being inclusive enough.
In 2018, the LGBTQ advocacy group hit Hollywood with a failing grade on its annual report card for the lack of roles for LGBTQ people and a scarcity of LGBTQ storylines in films from the prior year.
You can follow Alana Mastrangelo on Facebook and Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, on Parler at @alana, and on Instagram.
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