Richard Plepler, who led HBO for almost three decades, is reportedly teaming up with Apple. He’s not joining the iPhone maker, but his production company will create content for Apple TV+.
If a deal goes through, the man who greenlit Game of Thrones would be developing shows for Apple.
A major boon for Apple TV+
That Pleper and the iPhone maker are in talks was first reported by The Wall Street Journal, who cites only an unnamed “person familiar with the matter.” The deal allegedly hasn’t been finalized.
It’s not clear if the ex-HBO chief’s production company, RLP & Co., would be exclusively tied to Apple TV+, or if it would be free to make deals with others.
There’s apparently no talk of Pleper coming to work at Cupertino directly. He’s reportedly been focused on his own production company after leaving HBO in the wake of its takeover by AT&T.
Instead, he’s supposedly being wooed by Zack Van Amburg and Jamie Erlicht, who head up Apple’s video streaming service. They’ve been charged with building this service from the ground up. It debuted Nov. 1 with only a handful of shows, but there are plenty more in the pipeline.
Stephen Spielberg, J.J. Abrams, M. Night Shyamalan, and many others are producing content. And it appears a person with a long history of backing great programming like GoT and Veep could be contributing to Apple TV+ too.
