Married novelists Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman confirmed earlier this month that they were in the planning to develop a CBS television series about the 2016 Ghost Ship warehouse fire in Oakland, which resulted in the deaths of 36 people. The announcement, which came merely days after the third anniversary of the fire, faced intense backlash on social media, which eventually caused Waldman to announce on social that the project had been scrapped.
“Over the past few days, however, we’ve heard from parents of the victims, from friends and survivors, and from conscientious members of the community, appealing to us to reconsider telling the story of the Ghost Ship,” Waldman wrote. “These appeals have been heartbreaking to hear, and they have changed our minds. … At this time, therefore, we will not be proceeding, and will do our part to leave the families and survivors to their grief and their loss, in the fervent hope that someday they find not just comfort but also a measure of justice.”
The show was reportedly set to be based on New York Times Magazine writer Elizabeth Weil’s reporting, which has drawn criticism from several Oakland residents. A main point of contention was the alleged sympathetic portrayal of Max Harris, the “creative director,” of the warehouse who was recently acquitted of 36 counts of manslaughter in a criminal trial earlier this year.
“That New York Times profile was inaccurate in so many ways. It was a profile of a person that was told from one perspective, and none of it seemed like it was actually fact-checked against other people who knew him and were around him,”Oakland resident Mark Dias whose friends and coworkers, Em Bohlka and Donna Kellogg, were among the 36 victims.
The warehouse’s master tenant Derek Almena is currently set to face retrial, after a jury was set in a deadlock by 10-2 regarding his case. A judge rejected a plea deal from Almena, stating that he hadn’t accepted full responsibility and remorse for his part in the warehouse fire.
“If you’re even thinking of making some type of TV show or something to profit off of this, before the words even come out of your mouth, you should have backing by the families in some capacity,” Dias explained.
Photo Credit: Kellie MacDougall
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