Following its new hit comedy summer series, UMC – Urban Movie Channelis excited to announce the premiere of MINIMUM WAGE, an amusing new six-episode workplace comedy that centers around a struggling Koreatown burger joint forced to make radical changes to keep its doors open. Minimum Wage is from the original web series “Foodies,” winner of the “New Normal Writing Contest,” a joint venture between Adaptive Studios and Issa Rae and Deniese Davis’ ColorCreative. ColorCreative provides a platform to promote a new class of content creators and shine a light on overlooked and underrepresented voices in media. The first episode of Minimum Wage premieres on UMC today, October 27, 2017 with new episodes set to debut weekly through Friday, December 1, 2017.
Written by Rebecca Hu, Arpita Kumar, Maya Houston, Sam Bailey and Julia Bales, co-directed by Aaron Covington (co-writer of Creed) and Julia Bales, and executive produced by Adaptive Studios, Minimum Wage follows the lives of its five employees as they adjust to changes in management and panic ensues among the staff members. In the first episode of the series, Mr. Lee appoints his son, Jordan (John Yuan), to the role of manager for his restaurant, Lee’s Burger Block. Meanwhile, Ayana (Halleta Alemu), disappointed by Mr. Lee’s decision, struggles to find contentment in her position at Lee’s. However, when her YouTube video goes viral, she gets the spark she desperately needs to see her current struggles in a different light. As the series progresses, each episode highlights the backstory of a different team member. Along with John Yuan and Halleta Alemu, the ensemble cast of up-and-comers also includes Gabriel Brown,Alma Delfina, and D’Lo.
“Our goal has always been to highlight emerging and diverse voices and Minimum Wage is the perfect showcase of that. We are thrilled for Rebecca, Arpita, Sam, Julia and Maya, who are all first-time TV writers, and excited the series has found a home on UMC,” says Deniese Davis, COO and Co-Founder of ColorCreative.
Perrin Chiles, CEO of Adaptive Studios adds, “We are always looking for diverse stories and unique points of view to bring to life– even better when you can bring those narratives to life with partners like ColorCreative and UMC.”
“We are proud to premiere Minimum Wage on UMC, and credit Adaptive and ColorCreative for cultivating this exciting project,” says Angela Northington, GM & SVP of Content Acquisitions for UMC. “Our aim is to provide a streaming platform for diverse talent and collaborative work such as this, and we could not be more elated to be a home for the series.”
In addition to Minimum Wage, UMC also adds another quality drama series this month with the UMC premiere of the award-winning police procedural, 19-2, from sister channel Acorn TV. Referred to as “One of the best cop dramas ever”(Tribune News Service), the Canadian series follows Adrian Holmes (Arrow, Elysium) and Jared Keeso (Elysium, Falling Skies) as partners in the Montreal Police Department who must put their differences aside as their lives intertwine professionally and personally. An English-language remake of a popular Quebec show, 19-2 has been nominated for several Canadian Screen Awards, among which the series picked up wins for Best Dramatic Series (2016), Best Performance by an Actor in a Continuing Leading Dramatic Role (Adrian Holmes 2017, Jared Keeso 2015), and Best Direction. Catch the full first season now on UMC. Subsequent seasons of 19-2 will be added later this year and in 2018. Available at www.UMC.tv as well as on a variety of devices, UMC is the first premium subscription streaming service that showcases quality African American and urban entertainment across all genres from RLJ Entertainment
Source: prnewswire.com
