HBO To Examine Black Flags

As a collaborative pair, they may well be best known for their comedic output, but Bradley Cooper and Todd Phillips are about to get very serious indeed. The duo have snapped up the rights to the 2016 Pulitzer Prize-winning non-fiction book, Black Flags: The Rise Of ISIS, by Joby Warrick, and have a miniseries version in development with HBO. The source material will be adapted by Gregg Hurwitz, and the episodes of Black Flags will be directed by Tim Van Patten.


With Bradley Cooper and Todd Phillips on board as executive producers, HBO will present this tale that charts the evolution of ISIS, from its apparent roots in a prison in Jordan, to its overwhelming of parts of Syria, and its impact on communities around the world. The story also follows the international agents working in various capacities to combat this terrorist organization, with the ultimate goal of shutting it down for good.


This will be an interesting project for Phillips and Cooper whose first narrative film as co-producers is released on August 19th. That film is a comedy based upon real life occurrences, but one that takes a side-long glance at America’s fascination with heavy weaponry and the money it generates. Black Flags could not be further removed from that premise, and hopefully indicates a breadth of vision for the producing partners moving forward.