documentaries

Hulu’s Framing Britney Spears Follow-up, Controlling Britney Spears, Is Out Tonight

Britney Spears. Photo: FX Network

Oh, baby, baby … Hulu and FX did it again. They’ve announced a sequel to Framing Britney Spears, Controlling Britney Spears, to air on Friday, September 24. The documentary, directed by Samantha Stark and produced by Liz Day, follows up the viral doc with new allegations from “insiders with intimate knowledge” of the pop star’s life. Produced with the New York Times, the sequel seeks to sketch out a portrait of Spears’s life under the controlling conservatorship. “When Britney spoke publicly about her conservatorship in detail for the first time during a court hearing in June, she said a reason she hadn’t spoken up earlier is she didn’t think people would believe her,” Samantha Stark said in a statement. “She said she felt abused under the conservatorship and questioned whether the judge thought she was lying. Britney’s speech motivated the people in this film to seek us out to share their stories — at great risk to themselves — because they felt compelled to back up what Britney was saying with evidence they had or moments they witnessed.”

Spears’s next court date is September 29, where a judge will consider her request to remove her father from the role and her father’s petition to terminate the conservatorship. Framing Britney Spears received Emmy nominations as well as internet acclaim for its examination of Spears’s conservatorship in the media. “So many documentaries this year with other people’s takes on my life … what can I say … I’m deeply flattered!!!!” Spears reacted to the doc on Instagram this May. “These documentaries are so hypocritical … they criticize the media and then do the same thing?????” In May the BBC also released its take, The Battle for Britney: Fans, Cash and a Conservatorship. On September 26, CNN releases its special report, Toxic: Britney Spears’ Battle for Freedom. And this past week, Netflix announced Britney vs. Spears, its own doc on #FreeBritney, set for September 28. “I hope the profit from these docs go towards fighting against injustice #freebritney,” Sam Asghari, Britney Spears’s fiancé, said in reaction to Netflix’s Britney vs. Spears trailer Thursday evening. Controlling Britney Spears premieres simultaneously at 10 p.m. ET on FX and Hulu.

Hulu’s Framing Britney Spears Follow-up Is Out Tonight