Review of ABC's "For Life" TV Series - The New York Post

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https://nypost.com/2020/02/11/meet-the- ... -for-life/


Meet the real-life inspiration for ABC’s new series ‘For Life’

Review By Robert Rorke - a TV editor at the New York Post who has also previously written for Publishers Weekly, TV Guide, Los Angeles Times, and Seventeen. He received his MA in English from Stanford University.

February 11, 2020


ABC’s new drama series, “For Life,” follows the journey of convicted criminal Aaron Wallace (Nicholas Pinnock) as he educates himself behind bars to become a lawyer — and eventually win his own freedom.

Created by Hank Steinberg and produced by Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson (“Power”), the story is another ABC series based on the life of a real person (“The Rookie,” starring Nathan Fillion, is based on the life of LAPD officer William Norcross) whose mid-life crisis results in a brand-new life. In the case of Isaac Wright Jr. — an independent record producer who served seven-and-a-half years in the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton for leading a cocaine trafficking ring before overturning his conviction — the path to that new life required the patience and perseverance of a saint.

“I was sentenced in 1991 to life in prison,” Wright tells The Post. “I was in for the [drug] kingpin count but there were several other counts that added up to [another] 70 years.”

While in prison, Wright worked as a paralegal, helping other inmates gain their freedom. When Nicholas Bissell, the chief prosecutor in Wright’s case, was convicted of embezzlement in 1996, Wright’s case caught the attention of The New York Times, which wrote that Wright “proved that his 1991 conviction was based in part on an illegal seizure of cocaine by Mr. Bissell’s detective squad and on perjured testimony by three co-defendants who had been offered leniency by Mr. Bissell.”

Wright, 45, didn’t begin his formal education until he was out of jail. “I had to do four years of undergraduate,” he says. “I went to Thomas Edison State University in Trenton. I graduated from college in 2002, and then I went to law school at St. Thomas University in Miami in 2004.”

On “For Life,” Wallace becomes a lawyer while behind bars. Wright explains the change from the real story this way. “The reason we fictionalized it for the show is because you’re looking at seven-and-a- half years in prison. You’re looking at another three years for a law degree,” he says. “Then when I graduated in 2007, I passed the bar the very next year and the committee on character investigated me for nine more years before giving me a license.”

Wright was a practicing attorney when he met 50 Cent in 2016, after the rapper/producer was invited to perform at an illegal fight club in the Bronx. Jackson was hesitant; he risked losing his promoter’s license if he performed there and somebody posted a video to YouTube. “They went through several lawyers and a lot of money and nobody could help them,” says Wright, who was brought in on the recommendation of a friend. He succeeded in making the club legal and 50 Cent performed there. Wright and Jackson got to know each other and Jackson learned his life story. “This is not a movie,” Jackson told him. “This is a TV series. Would you give me the opportunity to see if I can make this happen?”

Wright signed a contract with Jackson for one dollar, telling him, “I want to be able to negotiate my own terms with whoever comes in. And he agreed. My contract is directly with Sony. Everybody was very fair with me. I kept my movie rights. I only gave my rights to a TV series.”

“For Life” will have 13 episodes for its first season. Wright is an executive producer and worked closely with the British-born Pinnock in fine-tuning the character, even loaning the actor a ring to wear while filming the series. “It was one of the most profound parts of this experience,” says Wright, a general practitioner with New Jersey law firm Hunt, Hamlin, and Ridley. “You saw me go through this process from prison to license. An aggressive fight for decades. Almost 20 years. I never really reflected on what I was going through. Watching Nicholas perform allowed me to view my suffering as a third person, [to] let me feel what I was suffering.”