Quick thread, but please indulge me. In Aug 2021, my book “Across the River,” about a New Orleans high school football program in a city besieged by gun violence, published. Big @TODAYshow piece. Smokehouse Pictures got film rights. @nypost & @latimes named it a best book of '21.

But for me, the true honor was that the wonderful, inspiring humans at Karr trusted me to tell their story: one of Black strength and incredible resolve in the face of poverty, all-too-frequent death, and long odds.

I’ve never thought more about compassion, humanity, and muting my own perspective and privilege. As the curator of an incredible story, I felt overwhelmed and transformed. When the book was done and a three-year journey was over, I cried in the back of Coach Brice Brown’s truck.

Today, @hulu and @espn began streaming a docuseries about Karr, gun violence, and football. It’s the same school, many of the same people, pretty much the exact same story as Across the River. So maybe you understand why I’m confused why this is being branded a “Hulu Original.”

Friends who attended last Saturday's premiere in New Orleans said there's no acknowledgement anywhere in the first episode that someone might’ve told this story before. Nothing in the credits, no sepia-toned photo of the book, nothing. So, yeah, this feels purposeful.

I should first say I don’t, and never did, own this material. From page 6: “This isn’t my story, after all. It’s theirs." These are real people, not “characters,” and I’m thrilled their story is getting a wider platform. The coaches, young people, and community deserve it.

But a frustrating trend seems to have now reached me. Increasingly often, the work of journalists, investigative reporters and scholars is being repurposed, repackaged and reused without attribution, credit or acknowledgement. I’m a print-media dinosaur, but this feels wrong.

Ethical considerations are being ignored, and it’s upsetting that, in a time when we need MORE transparency about how we tell stories and acquire information, this thirsty drive for #content (much of it in TV & film) is leading creators to deceive viewers...and would-be sources.

I’ve been told repeatedly there’s nothing we can do. There’s nothing illegal about it. It’s not plagiarism. You can't claim a real person's real story, which...yeah. But as an industry, I think we have to call this stuff what it is: shady, immoral, and—for me—flat-out unnecessary

In fall 2020, the director told me he got the idea from my @washingtonpost story. A year later, I learned filmmakers were leafing through my book, identifying sources I’d spent years getting to know & whose trust I’d earned, telling them their doc was “based on” Across the River.

Don’t take my word for it. Here’s one email from a producer, sent to a person not even affiliated with Karr, football, or Algiers. The only way they knew about this person was my book.

I asked the filmmakers to stop, which they did. But this person wasn’t the only one who reached out to ask if this was my project. I’ve had to explain over and over, and now pre-emptively here, that I’m not involved. Still, I wonder who agreed thinking I was.

When I wrote the book, I included 29 pages (!) of notes and citations. If you informed my thinking, enriched my reporting or offered me a plate of catfish, I named and acknowledged you. Because why wouldn’t I?

Storytelling, no matter the form, is a collaboration. We all rely on others to do this weird job, and it’s dishonest and insulting to pretend that’s untrue.

For two years I tried to talk w/ the director and come to a resolution, but he refused. Didn’t we want the same things? I *wanted* to shine a light on this community and get these people more attention. So why can’t we just be straight up, figure it out, and go drink a beer?

Anyway, I just believe in honesty: as journalists, storytellers, people. “Ain’t no secrets,” Brice boomed at like 4 a.m. once in 2019. That stuck with me, as a principle of good coaching, but also in how we should deal with each other.

Transparency isn’t always what the ego wants, but, man, it’s nice to sleep well at night. Pretending you got here first may get you some love, and admitting you weren’t may be uncomfortable. But this dinosaur? I still think being truthful is undefeated.

amazon.com/Across-River-D…

@actioncookbook 👆🏻