Fox Announces Hollywood’s K-pop Film With Scooter Braun

A K-Pop movie is reportedly in the works over at Fox, employing some of the biggest talents in South Korea and the U.S.

The pitch began with SB Projects, the multi-media company of Scooter Braun, according to a report by Deadline. The famed manager represents everyone from Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande to Psy, and now his company has sold a pitch to Fox 2000.

The film will reportedly follow an Asian American college student who winds up as the top competitor on a South Korean K-Pop Competition show. Before long, they will be battling it out at the highest level alongside other acts in the burgeoning global genre.

The screenplay comes from Elyse Hollander. So far, Hollander’s most noted work is a 2016 script called Blonde Ambition, which was meant to be a biopic of Madonna. Universal picked up the script, but it ultimately ended up on Hollywood’s infamous Black List.

Meanwhile, Braun himself has already been named an executive producer. He is joined by James Shin, SB Projects’ Vice President of Content Development, and Scott Manson, the company’s Chief Operating Officer. Other producers include Joshua Davis, Arthur Spector and Joshua Bearman, all from SB’s Epic Magazine, and John Zaozirny for Bellevue Productions. For Fox, Erin Siminoff and Jiao Chen will be on board as producers.

K-Pop has had a meteoric rise from a small niche market to an international sensation. The charge has arguably been led by boy band BTS in recent years. The Seoul-based group i one of the top acts in the world these days, filling out massive venues in the U.S. as easily as they do at home. They are closely followed by groups like Exo, Red Velvet and many others, showing that the industry is on the rise.

According to a report by Rolling Stone, K-Pop as a whole is now a $5 billion market and growing. The U.S. plays no small part in that. Back in June, “Ddu-du Ddu-du” by Blackpink hit No. 55 on the U.S. Billboard charts, as American musicians struggled to find footing themselves.

Meanwhile, the real victory for K-Pop in the U.S. is BTS’ upcoming stadium show in New York City’s Citi Field. It will mark the first time a K-Pop group has played in a stadium in the U.S., yet tickets sold out within minutes of becoming available. The concert is scheduled for Oct. 6.

Still, this new cultural cross over leaves room for plenty of fears, especially with the announcement of this new movie. K-Pop fanatics have already rushed to Twitter with their worries that, based on the predominately American production team, the movie will not accurately or respectively capture authentic K-Pop.

“Great now just make sure not to whitewash it,” one person wrote of the announcement.

“Brace yourselves,” tweeted another, “the colonisers discovered kpop.”

Others are waiting with bated breath for more information, and crossing their fingers that Braun will bring on plenty of Korean and Korean-American people to bring the film to life.