Cancellation of Netflix documentary about legendary popstar branded ‘a joke’ by director

Director Ezra Edelman has spoken out for the first time since Netflix axed his documentary about late US popstar Prince.

The 50-year-old filmmaker, who won an Oscar for OJ: Made In America, said the decision to can the nine-hour series was a ‘joke’ and ‘short-sighted.’

Instead, Prince’s estate will develop and produce a documentary about the late When Doves Cry singer’s life and career.

Now, Edelman has reacted to the decision to scrap his documentary a month after its cancellation was confirmed.

He said claims that his documentary was ‘sensationalised’ and contained ‘dramatic factual inaccuracies’ were a ‘joke’ on the Pablo Torre Finds Out podcast.

Edelman added: ‘The way that certain people, maybe the estate is characterising sort of, oh, the film’s bad or the film’s this, it’s negative. I mean, whatever. It’s a joke.

‘I mean, the whole idea is like, wait, so the estate had, here’s the one thing they’re allowed to do. Check the film for factual inaccuracies. Guess what? They came back with a 17-page document full of editorial issues, not factual issues.

‘Do you think I have any interest in putting on a film that is factually inaccurate?’

Edelman also complained that his work was being suppressed after reports Prince’s estate disagreed with allegations in the documentary that Prince was ‘physically and emotionally abusive.’

New York Times writer Sasha Weiss previously saw Edelman’s film and said that it features Prince’s ex-girlfriend Jill Jones, who alleges in a scene that the Purple Rain singer physically assaulted her.

Weiss also said the documentary detailed Prince’s dependence on pain medication and contained criticism that certain songs used antisemitic lyrics.

Edelman said executives were ‘afraid of Prince’s humanity’ but insisted his documentary was a ‘gift’ about a ‘brilliant and genius’ artist.

He explained: ‘I worked really hard making something, and now my art is being stifled and thrown away. This is the thing I just find galling. I mean, I can’t get past this, of the short-sightedness of a group of people whose interest is their own bottom line. They’re afraid of his humanity.

‘The lawyer who runs this estate essentially said he believed that this would do generational harm to Prince. In essence, that the portrayal of Prince in this film, what people learn about him, would deter younger viewers and fans, potentially, from loving Prince. They would be turned off.’

‘This is, I think, the big issue here: I’m like, “This is a gift — a nine-hour treatment about an artist that was, by the way, brilliant.” Everything about who you believe he is is in this movie. You get to bathe in his genius. And yet you also have to confront his humanity, which he, by the way, in some ways, was trapped in not being able to expose because he got trapped in his own myth about who he was to the world, and he had to maintain it.’

Last month, confirming the cancellation, Netflix said in a statement to the Minnesota Star Tribune: ‘The Prince Estate and Netflix have come to a mutual agreement that will allow the estate to develop and produce a new documentary featuring exclusive content from Prince’s archive. As a result, the Netflix documentary will not be released.’

Prince died in 2016 aged 57 following an accidental overdose of fentanyl.

He was one of the best-selling music artists of all time, having sold more than 100 million records worldwide.

Metro has contacted Netflix for comment.

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