Hulu is proceeding with a pilot order to Bammas, a comedy written, executive produced by and starring Opeyemi “Opey” Olagbaju & Biniam Bizuneh.
Executive producing the pilot are Grandfathered creator Danny Chun, who serves as showrunner, Portlandia and Baskets co-creator Jonathan Krisel, who is directing, and Ramy Youssef. ABC Signature is the studio.
In Bammas, a pair of young Ethiopian- and Nigerian-American best friends (Olagbaju, Bizuneh) struggle to overcome their loser reputations in a magical realist version of Washington, D.C.
Youssef executive produces through his Cairo Cowboy Banner, with Andy Campagna overseeing.
2022 Hulu Pilots & Series Orders
Olagbaju, a Nigerian-American writer and comedian, and Bizuneh, an Ethiopian-American writer and comedian, developed the original pitch at the Sundance Episodic Lab in 2019. Former The Office head writer Chun was their mentor at the Sundance Lab where he read their script, brought it to ABC Signature where he had had a string of overall deals, and put together the team to develop the pilot.
As a writer, Olagbaju has worked on Betty (HBO) Close Enough (HBO Max), Unrelated (Freeform), Doing the Most with Phoebe Robinson (Comedy Central), and I Love You America with Sarah Silverman (Hulu). As a standup comedian, he was a part of Just For Laughs New Faces in 2019 and performed on Comedy Central’s Featuring. He is repped by UTA, Jordan Tilzer at El Centro, and Schreck Rose.
As a writer, Bizuneh most recently wrote on Dave (FX) and Resident Alien (Syfy) and was a writer on ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live; he also created the web series How to be Broke for Comedy Central. As an actor, Bizuneh starred in the Lee Daniels pilot Culture Clash for Fox in 2019. As a standup, he has performed on Comedy Central’s Featuring and Viceland’s Flophouse. He is repped by UTA and Ginsburg Daniels.
Youssef is repped by Range Media Partners, WME and Morris Yorn. Chun is repped by WME and Price Management. Krisel is repped by UTA and Michael Lasker at Mosaic.