Michael Jackson's Last Days to Become a TV Show

Michael Jackson at a press conference held at the O2 Arena on March 5, 2009 in London, England.
MJ Kim/Getty Images

Michael Jackson's story is coming to the small screen, but probably not in the way you'd expect.

TV and radio personality Tavis Smiley has written a book called Before You Judge Me: The Triumph and Tragedy of Michael Jackson’s Last Days, due out in June 2016 via Little, Brown and Company. In a just-announced deal, Warner Bros. has signed a development and production deal with Smiley to turn the book (a novelistic retelling of Jackson's final 16 weeks) into a television series, according to a report from Deadline.

Warner is also planning to develop a television series around Smiley's recent book My Journey with Maya as a part of the same deal. The company was already working with Smiley on an "event series" surrounding his book Death of a King: The Real Story of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Final Year, which is being developed with J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot Productions.