HBO Documentary Films is an American production and distribution company, a division of the cable television network HBO that produces non-fiction feature films and miniseries.
The division releases between 10 and 15 documentaries per year for the network and provides limited theatrical distribution of certain films prior to their initial broadcast on HBO's linear television and streaming services.
History
The unit's longtime chief was Sheila Nevins, who initially served as Director of Documentary Programming from 1979 to 1982; upon returning in 1986, she headed HBO's documentary unit under various executive capacities (as Vice President of Documentary Programming, as Senior [later, Executive] Vice President of Original Programming and, beginning in 2004, as President of HBO Documentary Films) and served as executive producer of most of its documentary productions until she left the network in March 2018. Under Nevins, HBO's documentaries have won 35 News and Documentary Emmy Awards, 42 Peabody Awards, and 26 Academy Awards as well as 31 individual Primetime Emmy Awards honored to Nevins.[1][2] In December 2017, Nevins announced she would be stepping down from her position, with Nancy Abraham and Lisa Heller set to replace her.[3][4]
The network's first successful documentary was the six-part 1979 miniseries Time Was, a Dick Cavett-hosted retrospective that took a historical look at an individual decade in the 20th century—from the 1920s up to the 1970s—over the course of each episode. 1981's She's Nobody's Baby—produced in conjunction with Ms. magazine—traced the evolution of the societal role of American women during the 20th Century; the special earned HBO its first Peabody Award, the first to be won by a pay television service and the first of many HBO documentaries to receive the prestigious award.[5][6] HBO also produced a series of informational documentaries in partnership with Consumer Reports starting in 1980, detailing information on subjects encompassing product safety, personal finance and health.[7][8] One such documentary, AIDS: Everything You and Your Family Need to Know..But Were Afraid to Ask, which aired in 1987 at the height of the AIDS epidemic in the U.S., was hosted by Surgeon General C. Everett Koop and provided factual information on the AIDS and HIV viruses.[7][9]
In 2006, film director Spike Lee made a two-part four-hour documentary on Hurricane Katrina, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts. Also in 2006, documentary artist Lauren Greenfield directed Thin, a feature-length film about four young women struggling with eating disorders seeking treatment at the Renfrew Clinic in Florida. 2008 saw the U.S. television premiere of Baghdad High, which depicted the lives of four boys attending a high school in the Iraqi capital city over the course of one year, through a video diary filmed by the documentary's principal subjects who were provided cameras to film the project.[10]
Filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi and former New Jersey governor Jim McGreevey at the New York City premiere of Pelosi's HBO documentary about McGreevey, Fall to Grace, in March 2013.
In November 2008, HBO paid low seven figures for the U.S. television rights to the Amy Rice–Alicia Sams documentary By the People: The Election of Barack Obama. The film—which had a limited theatrical release in New York City and Los Angeles, and aired on HBO in November 2009—covered Obama's 2006 trip to Africa, his presidential primary campaign, the 2008 general election and his first Presidential inauguration.[11] In November 2012, HBO aired the four-part documentary, Witness, which devoted each part to one of four conflict regions—Juarez, Libya, South Sudan and Rio de Janeiro—as covered by a team of photojournalists based in those regions.[12] On March 28, 2013, the channel premiered the Alexandra Pelosi-directed Fall to Grace, about the infidelity scandal that led to the 2011 resignation of New Jersey governor Jim McGreevey and resulted in him coming out as gay.[13][14] That same year, HBO produced and distributed Life According to Sam a documentary film based on the life of Sam Berns.[15][16][17]
In February 2015, HBO premiered a six-part documentary from Andrew Jarecki, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, chronicling the mystery surrounding the New York real estate heir's alleged involvement in the unsolved 1982 disappearance of his wife, Kathie Durst; the 2000 execution-style killing of writer Susan Berman; and the 2001 death and dismemberment of Durst's neighbor, Morris Black. The miniseries gained broader exposure after Durst was arrested on first-degree murder charges in relation to Berman's death on March 14, 2015 (one day prior to the docuseries's finale). The evidence leading to his arrest included an envelope left by Berman after her murder and provided to the filmmakers for analysis by her stepson, Sareb Kaufman, with misspelled block letter handwriting matching an anonymous envelope sent to police in December 2000 to alert them to Berman's murder, and a rambling apparent confession by Durst—unaware that the microphone attached to him for his interview with Jarecki was still recording—to the murders of all three victims.[18][19]
HBO has also produced recurring documentary series, among the earliest and most notable being America Undercover, a monthly one-hour series of topical documentaries covering subjects in an un-sensationalized manner.[20][21] The America Undercover banner would go on to spawn two regular sub-series: Real Sex (a late night magazine-formatted series of specials that ran from 1992 to 2009, featuring frank explorations on a variety of mainstream and non-mainstream sexual matters[7]) and Autopsy (a series of specials that aired between 1994 and 2008, in which forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden provides analysis on criminal, suspicious and health-related death cases). One of America Undercover's most notable specials was 1985's Soldiers in Hiding, focusing on homeless veterans of the Vietnam War living in the wilderness, which was the first Academy Award nomination for a cable television service in the Best Documentary category (although HBO has had some of its documentaries enter limited theatrical release to qualify for Oscar nominations in later years).[7] HBO is also noted for its Sports of the 20th Century documentary brand. One of its most notable documentaries from that series was Dare to Dream, a 2005 film about the U.S. Women's Soccer Team and the roles of Mia Hamm, Kristine Lilly, Brandi Chastain, Joy Fawcett and Julie Foudy in the team's rise to prominence in sports.
Through a partnership with Vice Media, the network ran a monthly docuseries, Vice, featuring in-depth reports from host/creator/Vice magazine co-founder Shane Smith and a team of correspondents investigating political and cultural topics and using an immersionist filmmaking style. Running for six seasons from April 2013 to December 2018, the show won an Emmy Award for "Outstanding Informational Series or Special" in 2014.[22]Vice was cancelled on February 1, 2019, as part of a broader corporate reorganization at Vice Media; a companion daily news show, Vice News Tonight, was cancelled on June 10, 2019, when HBO announced it would be terminating its seven-year partnership with the company. (The Vice docuseries moved to Showtime and Vice News Tonight moved to Vice on TV in March 2020.)[23][24][25][26]
In 2020, HBO premiered The Vow, a documentary series revolving around NXIVM directed by Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer.[27][28] The series was renewed for a second and final season, which premiered in October 2022.[29]
In 2021, HBO premiered Allen v. Farrow, a documentary series examining the allegations made by Dylan Father against her father Woody Allen.[30] The first episode garnered over a million viewers, the most for an HBO documentary series since The Case Against Adnan Syed in 2019.[31] The series went on to earn several Primetime Emmy Award nominations.[32]
Jehane Noujaim is an American documentary film director best known for her films Control Room, Startup.com, Pangea Day and The Square. She has co-directed The Great Hack and The Vow with Karim Amer.
Kirby Bryan Dick is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and editor best known for directing documentary films. He received Academy Award nominations for Best Documentary Feature for directing Twist of Faith (2005) and The Invisible War (2012). He has also received numerous awards from film festivals, including the Sundance Film Festival and Los Angeles Film Festival.
Cecilia Peck is an American film producer, director and actress. She is the younger of two children of actor Gregory Peck and his second wife Veronique Passani.
World of Wonder Productions is an American production company founded in 1991 by filmmakers Randy Barbato and Fenton Bailey. Based in Los Angeles, California, the company specializes in documentary television and film productions with a key focus on LGBTQ topics. Together, Barbato and Bailey have produced programming through World of Wonder for HBO, Bravo, HGTV, Showtime, BBC, Netflix, MTV and VH1, with credits including the Million Dollar Listing docuseries, RuPaul's Drag Race, and the documentary films The Eyes of Tammy Faye (2000) and Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures (2016).
Elizabeth Freya Garbus is an American documentary film director and producer. Notable documentaries Garbus has made are The Farm: Angola, USA,Ghosts of Abu Ghraib,Bobby Fischer Against the World,Love, Marilyn,What Happened, Miss Simone?, and Becoming Cousteau. She is co-founder and co-director of the New York City-based documentary film production company Story Syndicate.
Sheila Nevins is an American television producer and head of MTV Documentary Films division of MTV Studios. Previously, Nevins was the President of HBO Documentary Films. She has produced over 1,000 documentary films for HBO and is one of the most influential people in documentary filmmaking. She has worked on productions that have been recognized with 35 News and Documentary Emmy Awards, 42 Peabody Awards, and 26 Academy Awards. Nevins has won 31 individual Primetime Emmy Awards, more than any other person. She is also a member of the board of directors for the Peabody Awards.
Amy Ziering is an American film producer and director. Mostly known for her work in documentary films, she is a regular collaborator of director Kirby Dick; they co-directed 2002's Derrida and 2020's On the Record, with Ziering also producing several of Dick's films.
Garrett Basch is an American film and television producer. He is best known for his work on the Emmy-winning series The Night Of and What We Do in the Shadows.
The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst is a 2015 HBO documentary miniseries about New York real estate heir Robert Durst, a convicted murderer. It was written by Andrew Jarecki, Marc Smerling, and Zac Stuart-Pontier.
Marc Smerling is an American film producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, and director. He was nominated for an Oscar for Capturing the Friedmans in 2003, and co-wrote and produced The Jinx, a six-part HBO documentary on suspected murderer Robert Durst. He directed the FX docuseries A Wilderness of Error based on the book of the same name.
Pineapple Street Studios is a podcast studio based in Brooklyn, New York. In August 2019, it was acquired by Entercom. Pineapple's work includes multi-episode narratives, investigative journalism, branded podcasts, and talk shows. They have created series for companies like Nike, Hulu, Netflix, HBO, and The New York Times. In 2020, they led all podcast companies with two Peabody Award nominations, for The Catch and Kill Podcast with Ronan Farrow and Running From Cops. Twelve of their shows have reached #1 on Apple Podcasts.
Karim Amer is an Egyptian-American film producer and director. He worked on The Square (2013) and The Great Hack (2019); the former was the first Egyptian film to earn an Academy Award nomination and went on to win three Emmy Awards, while the latter got nominated for an Emmy and a BAFTA Award. In 2020, he produced and directed The Vow, an HBO documentary series about the self-improvement group, NXIVM. In 2022, he produced and directed Flight/Risk for Amazon Studios, revolving around whistleblowers at Boeing.
We're Here is an American reality television series on HBO featuring former Drag Race contestants. The series premiered on April 23, 2020, and documents drag queens as they travel across the United States to recruit small-town residents to participate in one-night-only drag shows. In June 2020, the series was renewed for a second season which premiered on October 11, 2021. In December 2021, the series was renewed for a third season which premiered on November 25, 2022. The first three seasons featured Bob the Drag Queen, Eureka O'Hara and Shangela. A fourth season was announced in 2023 with new queens Jaida Essence Hall, Priyanka, Sasha Velour and Latrice Royale.
The Vow is an American true crime documentary series directed by Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer that revolves around the cult NXIVM and its leader Keith Raniere. The NXIVM documentary series premiered on August 23, 2020, on HBO.
Allen v. Farrow is an American documentary television miniseries directed by Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering that explores an allegation of sexual abuse made against Woody Allen in 1992. It consists of four episodes and premiered on February 21, 2021, on HBO.
Artemis Rising Foundation is a nonprofit organization and film production and television production company, founded by Regina K. Scully.
100 Foot Wave is an American documentary television series directed by Chris Smith, revolving around big-wave surfer Garrett McNamara as he traveled to Nazaré, Portugal with the goal of conquering a 100-foot wave. It premiered on HBO on July 18, 2021.
Catch and Kill: The Podcast Tapes is an American documentary television miniseries, directed and produced by Randy Barbato and Fenton Bailey. It follows Ronan Farrow, as he conducts interviews with whistleblowers, victims, private investigators and sources for his book Catch and Kill. It consists of 6-episodes and premiered on July 12, 2021, on HBO.
Alex Stapleton is an American director, showrunner, and executive producer of documentary feature films and unscripted television.
Inbal B. Lessner is a producer and film editor. She has served as producer and editor on Brave Miss World (2013), Seduced: Inside the NXIVM Cult (2020), and Escaping Twin Flames (2023).
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