EXCLUSIVE: After finding success on so many fronts throughout her career, former UFC champion and WWE star Ronda Rousey has now found a new challenge: the role of screenwriter. Sources tell Deadline that Rousey has signed a deal to adapt the script for her own biopic at Netflix, which would be based on her two memoirs. My fight/your fight And Our fight, which she wrote together with her sister Maria Burns Ortiz. Although her contract has not yet been finalized, Chernin Entertainment is expected to produce, according to sources.
Netflix declined to comment.
The project was originally set up at Paramount in 2015 when the studio acquired the rights to her first memoir My fight/your fight. After some regime changes at the studio, the rights eventually lapsed and Netflix eventually picked them up after Netflix executive Michelle Evans championed the project, having long been a fan of Rousey. What’s interesting about how much time has passed since the first memoir was published is that Rousey has since written a second memoir. Our fight, which goes into more detail about her life. These new details include her first loss to Holly Holm and suicidal thoughts after the fight, her history of concussions that preceded her MMA career, and her tumultuous relationship with her longtime trainer Edmond Tarverdyan.
What makes this situation so unique is how hard she fought to ensure that she was the one to adapt this script, when veteran screenwriters are so often hired to write biopics (Mark Bomback was originally slated to adapt ). My fight/your fight when it was at Paramount). Rousey is known for putting in so much effort, and according to insiders familiar with the process, that was the case here as she worked earnestly to understand what it would take to turn her memoir into a Convert script that the studios would like.
Wanting to hone her skills as a screenwriter, Rousey connected with Adam Novak, an experienced executive in WME’s story group, which identifies source material on behalf of its clients. Novak. A seasoned veteran who had been with the agency for 33 years sent her scripts to report on, critiqued her work and gave her feedback. While editing 30 to 40 scripts, she learned the structure and technique of screenwriting and eventually wrote her own screenplay.
After months of working in reporting, she was challenged by her longtime WME agents, who had worked with her before the UFC, to write the script about her life, a task she accomplished all by herself in just seven days which blew her away Agents couldn’t believe the script came from a first-time writer. The script was soon put out there, and Chernin quickly moved to arrange a meeting to act as producer, and then sat down and signed on as producer.
Insiders say they knew they had something special when the package was brought to market, and that the front page of the script was torn down before meeting with Netflix, so executives went in with no preconceptions and were just figuring out who was writing after they finished the script. After reading the script, execs immediately inquired about the writer, and even when they found out it was Rousey, it didn’t take long for her to make an offer.
While the project was originally conceived as something she would also star in when it was at Paramount, sources now say she only plans to write the film, with meetings with potential candidates for the role of Rousey expected in the coming years months will begin.