With Worst Roommate Ever, we continue our coverage of the True Crime genre in Part 2 of Camran Shealy’s snapshots survey of 20+ recently announced or released projects.
Read Part 1 here, including The Tinder Swindler and more.
And here below is Part 2…
My Podcast, Webinars + MIPCOM Workshop
New Trends in True Crime: Streamers are Changing the Game… What producers need to know! with Ed Hersh
- Ed Hersh, senior consultant and veteran channel executive, discusses what producers need to know about the changing world of True Crime storytelling.
- Read Ed’s recent popular analysis and our survey of the latest projects in the genre.
- Listen here.
How to Develop Your Documentary Concept into a Compelling Pitch, with Tom Jennings
- Tom Jennings is the inspiring Peabody & PGA award-winning producer for leading channels & platforms worldwide.
- In our webinar, Tom will answer your questions about how to find a great idea for an unscripted show, and then develop the concept into winning pitch.
- The webinar is for subscribers to my Desktop Documentaries Watch for more details!
- Thursday, September 8, 10am/PT, 1pm/ET.
Netflix & the Streamers: the latest on what they buy and what they pay
- I join Show&Tell’s Keith Ochwat to discuss the streamers’ evolving content needs.
- Webinar is for Show&Tell subscribers. Watch out for details.
- Thursday, September 15, 345pm/ET.
MIPCOM
- I’m very excited about attending MIPCOM, starting Sunday, October 16 in Cannes.
- On Wednesday October 19, I’ll moderate an afternoon session dedicated to three revealing Unscripted Case Studies.
- Details to follow.
Worst Roommate Ever
When Alex Miller let Jed Creek rent her room via Craigslist, she had no idea that he was a notorious serial squatter, and that he would use his knowledge of tenancy laws to slowly kick her out of her own home.
Commissioner: Netflix
Director Domini Hofmann
Production Companies
Executive Producers
Press coverage
- Worst Roommate Ever’: Netflix Exposes the Terrifying Roommates From Hell
- 6 Harrowing Docuseries For True Crime Buffs Available on Streaming
- The Chilling True Story Of Worst Roommate Ever Subject Dorothea Puente
Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King
- A group of investors turned sleuths as they try to unlock the suspicious death of cryptocurrency multimillionaire Gerry Cotten and the missing $250 million they believe he stole from them.
Commissioner: Netflix
Director: Luke Sewell
Production Companies: Minnow Films
Executive Producers
Press coverage
- This is “Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King” the Netflix documentary that portrays the life and mysterious death of a crypto scammer
- Everything We Know About Netflix’s “Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King”
The Con
- The Con explores the troubling tales of people taken in by claims and promises that proved too good to be true, from identity fraud and misleading romance to the high-profile college admission scandal and Fyre Festival.
- It reveals how the victims were fooled and shows the cost of their false trust — emotional and financial.
Commissioner
Director
Production Companies
Executive Producers
Coverage
- ABC News Studios Unveils Slate Of Non-Fiction Projects As Part Of Official Launch
- ABC News Studios launches with slate of titles already in production
- What did Aubrey Lee Price do to fake his own death? ABC’s The Con to revisit pastor-turned-banker’s life and crimes
- ABC News Launches Studio to Expand Documentary Efforts
Diamond Hands: The Legend of WallStreetBets
- When the smart money was betting GameStop would go under, an army of irreverent traders tried to take Wall Street down instead.
- Diamond Hands is their story. This is the legend of the subreddit/WallStreetBets.
Commissioner: MSNBC Films
Director
Executive Producers
Coverage
The Murders Before the Marathon
Series examines the potential connection between Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev and the unsolved murders of Brandon Mess, Raphael Teken and Erik Weissman inside Mess’s apartment in September 2011.
Commissioner: ABC News Studios for hulu
Director: Jesse Sweet
Production Companies
Executive Producer: Matt Cook
Coverage
- Upcoming Hulu docuseries examines link between Boston Marathon bombing, Waltham triple-murder
- Hulu Docuseries Looks Into Link Between Marathon Bomber, Triple Murder
- ABC News Studios Unveils Slate Of Non-Fiction Projects As Part Of Official Launch
Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey
- Examines the rise of Warren Jeffs in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and his shocking criminal case.
Commissioner: Netflix
Director
Production Companies
Executive Producers
Press coverage
- How Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey Takes True-Crime to Church
- Everything You Should Know About Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey’s True Story
- The Horrifying True Story of ‘Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey’, and the Cult of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints
Sound of The Police
- Announced series digs deep into America’s long and painful history of police brutality and misconduct in Black communities.
Commissioner: ABC News Studios
Director: Stanley Nelson
Coverage
- ABC News Studios Unveils Slate Of Non-Fiction Projects As Part Of Official Launch
- ABC News Studios launches with slate of titles already in production
REEPERBAHN SPECIAL UNIT 65
- Featured at MIPTV 2022, this series explores the history of Hamburg’s red-light district in the 1980s, when the notorious area’s “Golden Era” was ending.
- Battles between rival gangs had intensified with the cocaine trade, while sex work was under increased scrutiny with the arrival of the HIV pandemic.
Director
Production Companies
Coverage
- First docuseries funded by German Motion Pictures Fund set for 2022 release
- True-Crime Documentary Series ‘Reeperbahn Special Unit 65’ Boarded by Studio Hamburg Enterprises
- Exclusive: ARD orders Gebrueder Beetz & Studio Hamburg’s true crime doc
Girl in the Picture
- A young mother’s mysterious death and her son’s subsequent kidnapping blow open a decades-long mystery about the woman’s true identity, and the murderous federal fugitive at the center of it all.
Commissioner: Netflix
Director: Skye Borgman
Production Companies
Executive Producer: Ariane Wu
Coverage
- ‘Girl in the Picture’ restores an identity lost to decades of horror
- The big problem with Netflix’s horrific, compulsive new film Girl in the Picture
Captive Audience: A Real American Horror Story
- Follows the life of Steven Stayner diving into his family’s 50-year journey to unravel the tale of two brothers, one deemed a villain and the other a hero.
Commissioner: Hulu
Director: Jessica Dimmock
Production Companies
Executive Producers
Press coverage
- Hulu grows true crime slate with “Dead Asleep,” “Captive Audience”
- ‘Captive Audience: A Real American Horror Story’ and the Fallacy of ‘True’ Crime
- ‘Captive Audience’ is a long-winded series depicting the Stayner family’s history with true crime
ROOM 2806: THE ACCUSATION, an original documentary series from France’s CAPA Productions for Netflix
An Exclusive Documentary Business Case Study
- Room 2806: The Accusation follows the sexual assault case in New York involving French presidential candidate and IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
- On May 14 2011, Nafissatou Diallo, a hotel maid reported that DSK had forced her to perform oral sex in his suite in the Sofitel Hotel on West 46th Street in Manhattan.
- Strauss-Kahn was arrested hours later at JFK airport, just minutes before the doors closed for his flight to Paris.
- The New York District Attorney’s office controversially withdrew its effort to prosecute DSK based on their lack of confidence in Diallo’s character and story.
- The series is an important story that reveals themes of power, celebrity, gender, class, character and sexuality.
- Read my detailed Case Study here of the 4-parter from France’s CAPA Productions (February 2021)
Music Docs: $30 Milion for Elton
- Music is another hot genre favored by platform buyers.
- Read Streamers Spend on Music Documentaries. Big Stars. Unique Access. Sky High Budgets. $25 Milllion for Billy Eilish
