The Truth About Jussie Smollett? is a 2025 documentary film directed by Gagan Rehill and produced by Raw TV for Netflix. The film revisits the highly publicized 2019 incident in which actor Jussie Smollett reported being the victim of a hate crime in Chicago and the ensuing police investigation, media coverage, criminal case, and political fallout.[6]
Released globally on Netflix on 22 August 2025, the film includes Smollett's first extended on-camera account of the case since 2019, alongside interviews with Chicago police officials, journalists, lawyers, and the Osundario brothers, whose statements were central to the prosecution’s theory.[7]
The documentary summarizes a complex legal narrative. Smollett was convicted in 2021 of filing false police reports and was sentenced in 2022, but he appealed the case, and the Illinois Supreme Court overturned the conviction on 21 November 2024, on due process grounds related to an earlier 2019 plea agreement with prosecutors. The Illinois Supreme Court made no factual finding regarding his innocence or guilt.[8] In interviews in the documentary, Smollett maintains that he is innocent.[9]
Early morning of 29 January 2019, actor Jussie Smollett reported to Chicago police that he had been attacked by two masked men who shouted racist and homophobic slurs before placing a noose around his neck.[10] News of the alleged hate crime quickly spread, drawing statements of solidarity from celebrities, politicians, and advocacy groups. Early footage of Smollett on stage at a concert just days later, as well as clips of supportive headlines and social media posts, establish the climate of sympathy that initially surrounded his case.[11]
Police investigation, introduces surveillance footage and the accounts of Chicago Police Departmentdetectives. Investigators describe their growing suspicions about inconsistencies in Smollett’s story and detail how evidence, including video recordings and ride-hailing records, led them to identify brothers Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo. CPD testimony with commentary from journalists who covered the case, illustrated how quickly the narrative shifted from one of victimhood to doubt and skepticism.[12]
The third act focuses heavily on the Osundairo brothers themselves. In extended interviews, they recount their past friendship with Smollett and claim that he orchestrated the attack to generate publicity. Archival courtroom footage and prosecutors’ arguments are used to illustrate the prosecution’s case during Smollett’s 2021 trial for disorderly conduct and filing false police reports. At the same time commentary from legal analysts who question the reliability of the brothers’ testimony, leaving room for ambiguity in the viewer’s interpretation.[13]
Attention then shifts to Smollett’s defense and the wider social context. Smollett appears in a sit-down interview, reflecting on the personal cost of the accusations and maintaining that he did not fabricate the attack. Supporters interviewed in the film argue that systemic racism and homophobia in policing influenced the investigation, while critics stress the damage the case caused to public trust. By presenting opposing perspectives, the documentary highlights the polarized reactions that have defined public discourse since 2019.
The documentary examines the Illinois Supreme Court’ s November 2024 decision to overturn Smollett’s conviction on due-process grounds, while emphasizing that the ruling did not equate to a declaration of innocence.[8] The closing montage sets against media clips, courtroom images, and Smollett’s own words, underscoring its refusal to provide a definitive answer. Instead, viewers are invited to weigh the conflicting accounts.
Production
Netflix commissioned the film from RAW, the production company behind the Netflix titles Don’t F**k with Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer and The Tinder Swindler.[14][15] It is directed by Gagan Rehill, whose previous work includes Ashley Madison: Sex, Lies & Scandal (2024). Publicity materials and trade reports identify Tom Sheahan and Tim Wardle as producers.[16][17]
On 22 July, Netflix ordered a 90-minute documentary titled The Truth About Jussie Smollett?, which focuses on the controversy surrounding Smollett's staged hate crime case. The film features a new interview with Smollett, conducted six years after the events first drew widespread public attention. Netflix described the film as “a shocking true story of an allegedly fabricated account.”[18]
According to trade coverage, Netflix greenlit the film from RAW after the company’s prior success on high-profile true-crime features,[19] early reports framed the project as an attempt to re-examine the case with “new evidence” and previously unseen footage. TheWrap and Realscreen provided industry background on RAW’s involvement and the framing used in marketing materials.[20][21]
Writers and researchers for the film are described in publicity and press reports as documentary specialists and investigative journalists working under Rehill’s direction; the production emphasized compiling and presenting multiple verified sources rather than producing a single prosecutorial narrative.[6][21] During an interview, Via Zoom with The Hollywood Reporter Rehill stated
“You can tilt it one way [and] it will look like one thing,” he said of he-said/she-said he-said/they-all-said nature of the Smollett case. “You can tilt it another and there’s another story behind it.” “I want … viewers to have a conversation, a debate about that themselves,” “That’s part of the documentary for me — the after conversation, the aftermath of watching it. For that reason, I’m sort of taking myself out of the equation in terms of where I land.” Fine. For what it’s worth, there have been a whole gamut of responses from Rehill’s small sample size in screenings.
“Everyone comes away from this with a different sort of opinion,” Rehill said. “I’ve spoken to a few people now who’ve watched it, who weren’t part of the production, who have all given completely different reads. Completely different. And I think that’s part of the nature of this … it’s open to interpretation.”
Producers positioned the project as both an investigative feature and a cultural analysis, aiming to explore the complications of the incident and the following media coverage. The intention was to position the case within broader discussions of race, sexuality, celebrity culture, and misinformation in the United States.[23]
The filmmakers described a research-led writing process that made use of public court records, media coverage, surveillance and archival footage, and on-camera interviews. Press coverage and the Netflix press page state the production team interviewed a wide range of participants — including Smollett, the Osundairo brothers, former Chicago police officials, journalists and legal commentators — and used those interviews alongside documentary research to structure the narrative.[6][24]
The film faced the usual challenges typical of controversial topics: several individuals opted not to participate, while promotional efforts highlighted the inclusion of rare or previously unreleased footage alongside efforts by the filmmakers to verify claims through documents and testimony. Smollett had sought to have the footage admitted as evidence during his 2021 trial, but it was delivered to his defense team too late to be used. He stated: “[The footage] was brought to my lawyers a couple days before we started trial and they were like, ‘Yeah, we already got our defense, so it’s too late to bring that in, we can’t do anything about it,’” Smollett said. “They did not go with the truth. They went with defending against the lies.””[25]
Release
Netflix released the documentary on 22 August 2025; the Netflix Media Center lists a U.S. release at 12:00 a.m. PT on that date.[26] The title card and synopsis appear on Netflix’s consumer listing. The film was widely covered in entertainment press roundups of that weekend’s streaming releases.[27][28]
Reception
Critical response
Early critical reaction was mixed. Writing for The Guardian Hannah J Davies criticized the film’s speculative framing while acknowledging its access to key figures, calling it “bold, shocking … and utter nonsense.”[29] Ed Power of The Daily Telegraph gave it 3 out of 5 stars, writing that “the evidence is inconclusive.”[30]Variety’s Daniel D’Addario wrote that the documentary "gathers plenty of raw reporting" but is "undone by the challenges its particular story presents", criticizing its ambiguous tone and "soggy and obvious" presentation.[9]Time noted that director Gagan Rehill deliberately avoided delivering conclusions, saying: “I want people to come away… we live in a society now where these two truths can exist next to each other.” The film was commended for showcasing both supporting and skeptical viewpoints without privileging either.[6]
Jacob Oller of the The A.V. Club described the documentary as "wishy-washy," suggesting it offered no clear viewpoint, instead serving as a "Rorschach test mess" that reinforced divisiveness rather than clarifying the case.[31]
Karina Adelgaard of Heaven of Horror offered a more positive review, awarding the film 4 out of 5 stars. The reviewer praised its comprehensive coverage of all key perspectives, including Smollett, police, journalists, and the Osundairo brothers and emphasized the effectiveness of the title’s question mark in reflecting the elusiveness of truth.[32]
Reaction and controversy
The documentary's release prompted immediate debate. Several critics faulted the film for promoting speculative lines of inquiry including suggestions that Chicago police mishandled or tampered with evidence, without clear supporting proof, a criticism emphasized in major reviews.[33]
The film’s director Gagan Rehill’s decision to present competing accounts rather than assert a definitive conclusion produced polarized audience reaction at early screenings and online, with some viewers saying the documentary reinforced their skepticism of Smollett and others saying it raised legitimate questions about the investigation.[34][6] In his review for Variety, D’Addario wrote that Smollett "seems overmatched at times in trying to make the case, appealing simply to viewers’ faith in him. 'I know what I saw,' he says, and various versions like it, in claiming that his attacker, contrary to evidence that had been available to this point, was a white MAGA supporter... he hasn’t had proof to support this..."[9]
Smollett publicly maintained prior to the film’s release that the documentary contains never-before-seen footage that, he said, corroborates his account, statements that were widely reported and became part of the pre-release conversation around the film.[25]People magazine also reported Smollett saying in the film that he felt “extremely emasculated” by the public’s reaction to the alleged attack and reiterated that his payment to the Osundairo brothers was for an herbal supplement—not to stage a crime.[35]
Commentators also placed the film in the background of the case’s complex legal history, including Smollett’s 2021 conviction and the Illinois Supreme Court’s 21 November 2024, decision to overturn that conviction on due-process grounds, noting that the ruling did not equate to a finding of factual innocence and that the legal backdrop contributed to the intensity of public reaction.[36]
1 2 3 D'Addario, Daniel (20 August 2025). "'The Truth About Jussie Smollett?' Can't Answer Its Title Question: TV Review". Variety. Los Angeles. Retrieved 20 August 2025. That [the question mark] is, frankly, a little clumsy is also a key part of the experience of this doc, which gathers plenty of raw reporting, but assembles it into a story only as best it can, ultimately undone by the challenges its particular story presents.
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