David Simon Wanted To Do A Prequel To ‘The Wire,’ But There Was Just One Problem

Early last year, we learned that Wendell “Bunk” Pierce had tried very hard to get a prequel to the HBO series, The Wire off the ground. Basically, that prequel would’ve centered on a character played by Sam Jackson who was a drug kingpin running the Towers before he was overthrown by Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell. In other words, it would’ve been something akin to the Avon and Stringer origins story.

I would’ve paid SO much money to see that. Considering how many people have seen The Wire since it went off the air (every white person over the age of 30 in North America), a prequel I think would’ve put up huge numbers at the box office.

There was just one problem, however. In an interview with The Daily Beast, Dominic “McNulty” West conceded that there was a lot of talk about a feature film based on The Wire, but David Simon put the kibosh on it for one very good reason.

Here’s West, asked by The Daily Beast about the prequel:

“There was constant talk of The Wire movie in the bar for five years, but nothing seemed to come about. I was talking to Wendell Pierce about it more recently because he was the driving force behind the movie idea, and we wanted David Simon to write it, obviously. But David Simon said, ‘It can’t be a sequel, it has to be a prequel. And that’s going to be all right for the black actors, but for the white ones, they don’t look younger than they did 10 years ago.’” West laughed, before adding in jest, “Whitey doesn’t look so good.”

“Whitey doesn’t look so good!”

Is he right about that? Here’s West in 2004.

Here’s West in 2014:

Wow. The dude hasn’t aged a day in a decade.

Source: Daily Beast

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