'We Screwed Up': HBO CEO Speaks On 'Confederate' Backlash, Is Still Moving Forward With The Series

Source: YouTube

HBO CEO Richard Pleper recently spoke about the immediate backlash that followed the press release of forthcoming television series Confederate.

Speaking at the Vanity Fair summit Pleper said that HBO "screwed up in an important way," with the series supposed to show "what we call the thin line, the thin veneer of civilization."

"Where we screwed up was we tried to explain a complicated subject in a press release in three paragraphs," Pleper said according to Deadline. "A lie goes halfway around the world before the truth puts its boots on and we bear some of the responsibility for that."

The CEO also said that the intent of the show is to bring people together and not divide them, saying: "We have a long tradition through our documentaries, through our film, of trying to bring the capacity of people to see other people in a more profound way, to the table, and we use our documentaries and our films to try to do that. Creative producers have always known that was part of our way, and that’s why they come to us to do that."

READ: 'It's Not Whips And Plantations': HBO President Addresses 'Confederate' Backlash

The apology is not much different HBO President Casey Bloys', who described the rollout of the series as "misguided" a couple months back.

"File this under hindsight is 20/20," Bloys said. "If I could do it over again, HBO's mistake — not the producers' — was the idea that we would be able to announce an idea that is so sensitive that requires such care and thought on the part of the producers in a press release was misguided on our part."

HBO is still moving forward with the series, which "takes place in an alternate timeline, where the Southern states have successfully seceded from the Union, giving rise to a nation in which slavery remains legal and has evolved into a modern institution."

Source: deadline.com