After apologizing for posting a video titled “Harriet Tubman Sex Tape” on his All Def Digital YouTube channel last week, Russell Simmons has now announced that he is developing a biopic on the civil rights abolitionist.
Tubman’s family reached out to Simmons asking that he produce the film on the historical figure.
“The last few days I have been speaking to some of the direct descendants of Harriet Tubman,” Simmons tweeted. “They have not only accepted my apology but we agree that we should begin immediately to develop the story of Harriet Tubman.”
News of the upcoming biopic come only days after Simmons caught flak for posting a video that portrayed an actor playing Tubman having sex with a slave master and using it as leverage to build the Underground Railroad.
It wasn’t long before Simmons issued an apology for the video after the NAACP asked that it be taken down.
“I’m a very liberal person with thick skin. My first impression of the Harriet Tubman piece was that it was about what one of the actors said in the video, that 162 years later, there’s still tremendous injustice,” said Simmons in an apology issued on his website GlobalGrind.com.
“I can now understand why so many people are upset. I have taken down the video. Lastly, I would never condone violence against women in any form, and for all of those I offended, I am sincerely sorry.”