Documentary Now! Information

Documentary Now! is an American mockumentary television series on IFC, created by Saturday Night Live alumni Fred Armisen, Bill Hader, Seth Meyers, and director Rhys Thomas, with Armisen and Hader starring in the series and Thomas co-directing. The series spoofs celebrated documentary films by parodying the style of each documentary with a similar, but fictitious, subject. Helen Mirren serves as host for the series, which is executive produced by Armisen, Hader, Meyers, Thomas and SNL creator Lorne Michaels. The episode "DRONEZ: The Hunt for El Chingon" premiered online on August 10, 2015, followed by the regular television premiere on August 20. The series has been renewed through season 3 which is scheduled to start February 20, 2019.

Premise

Within the universe of the show itself, Documentary Now! is a long-running news magazine for documentaries, initially celebrating its 50th season. Mirren appears at the beginning of each episode to introduce the documentary that the audience is about to see.

Hader and Armisen usually each play a lead or a prominent supporting character in each episode's documentary, though neither appears in every episode. Otherwise, the cast is entirely different from one episode to the next. The end credits are also made to appear as though they are the credits for the documentary, and not for the show itself.

Cast

• Bill Hader
• Fred Armisen
• Helen Mirren

Episodes

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| color2 = #9cd298 | link2 = Documentary Now!#Season 2 (2016) | episodes2 = 7 | start2 = | end2 =

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Season 1 (2015)

| ShortSummary = An in-depth look at the daily lives of two aging socialites and their crumbling estate. | Viewers = 0.16 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }}

| ShortSummary = An investigation into the seminal 1922 documentary "Kunuk The Hunter" that attempts to separate what is real from what is fabrication. | Viewers = 0.25 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }} </ref> | OriginalAirDate = | ShortSummary = The hipster media empire DRONEZ sends a series of its notoriously fearless journalists to track down Mexico's most wanted drug lord.

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This episode was originally scheduled to air August 27, but IFC postponed its release due to a scene in which two journalists are killed on-camera, this following the live broadcast of two television station employees' murders in Virginia one day earlier. The episode "Kunuk Uncovered" aired in its place. "Dronez" was previously available online via the Vice website, which supported the episode, but later pulled it per an agreement with IFC. | Viewers = 0.11 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }}

| ShortSummary = An investigation into the wrongful conviction of a man sentenced to death for a 1976 murder. | Viewers = 0.09 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }}

| ShortSummary = A documentary crew travels to rborg, Iceland for the annual festival honoring American gangster Al Capone. |Viewers = 0.16 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }}

| ShortSummary = A documentary charting the rise and fall of soft rock's seminal band, the Blue Jean Committee. | Viewers = 0.11 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }}

| ShortSummary = Part two of the documentary of the Blue Jean Committee, the revolutionary Chicago turned California soft rock group. | Viewers = 0.10 | LineColor = 84dbe2 }} }}

Season 2 (2016)

| ShortSummary = A behind-the-scenes view of Ben Herndon's 1992 run for governor of Ohio, focusing on his core campaign staff. | Viewers = 0.12 | LineColor = 9cd298 }}

| ShortSummary = A look at the strict owner of a remote Colombian restaurant famed for its rice and chicken, and the son he has tutored and hopes will take over for him some day. | Viewers = 0.11 | LineColor = 9cd298 }}

| ShortSummary = Parker Gail performs a stream of consciousness monologue about the day he was kicked out of his New York City apartment. | Viewers = 0.11 | LineColor = 9cd298 }}

| ShortSummary = Four 1960s salesmen go door to door trying to sell globes to uninterested people. | Viewers = 0.13 | LineColor = 9cd298 }}

| ShortSummary = In 1987, new wave band Test Pattern plays its final concert. | Viewers = 0.120 | LineColor = 9cd298 }}

| ShortSummary = A candid docu-memoir of Hollywood Legend Jerry Wallach, and his forty year quest to win an Oscar. | Viewers = 0.062 | LineColor = 9cd298 }}

| ShortSummary = The conclusion of Jerry Wallach's tale, from 'Blondes, Blondes, Blondes and a Millionaire' to 'Robot Bachelor'. | Viewers = 0.090 | LineColor = 9cd298 }} }}

Production

Development

On March 20, 2014, the series was announced under the working title American Documentary. Documentary Now! parodies well-known documentaries"?such as The Thin Blue Line and Grey Gardens"?but with fictitious subjects. British actress Helen Mirren serves as the host for the series, to add "gravitas" to each documentary. Each of the seven episodes is shot using different styles of documentary filmmaking, and "honors some of the most important stories that didn't actually happen."

The idea for the series was born on Saturday Night Live, where Armisen, Hader and Meyers were former cast members; in 2013, Armisen and Hader portrayed faded British punk rock stars in a segment, Ian Rubbish and the Bizzaros: History of Punk, made in the style of This Is Spinal Tap.

The producers made it a priority to realistically spoof famed documentaries, even going so far as to track down the original 1920s-era camera lenses used to film Nanook of the North (1922). They declined to do another Spinal Tap-type mockumentary and consciously avoided any similarities in editing or style. "Spinal Tap set such a great precedent that we had to watch out for repeating any of those same beats," Armisen said. "It"?s one of the greatest movies ever."?

The six-episode order limited the first season of the show, Seth Meyers told Collider, stating that they were not able to spoof Michael Moore documentaries, or the phenomenally successful HBO miniseries The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst. "The Jinx happened a little too late for us," Meyers said of the miniseries, which aired in February and March 2015. "We almost tried to pull it off. We talked a lot about that kind of documentary, where the filmmaker sets out to make a documentary, and then, very slowly, it becomes clear the documentary is about himself."?

Filming

Two of the episodes were shot in Iceland and The Hunt for El Chingon was filmed in Tijuana. To film the second-season episode "Final Transmission", the Documentary Now! crew staged a real-life concert (attracting around 1,000 people) in which Armisen, Hader, and guest star Maya Rudolph performed as the Talking Heads-inspired band the episode centers around.

Reception

In its year-end roundup, the New York Times named Documentary Now! as one of "The Best TV Shows of 2015". "This series, introduced in August," wrote Times critic Neil Genzlinger, "consists not of actual documentaries but of parodies of actual documentaries. It sure is funny, though." The series has earned a 94% rating on the review site Rotten Tomatoes.

Accolades

Year	Ceremony	Category	Nominee(s)	Result
2016	Primetime Emmy Awards	Outstanding Variety Sketch Series	Documentary Now!
	Critics' Choice Television Awards	Best Actor in a Comedy Series	Bill Hader
2017	Writers Guild of America Awards	Comedy/Variety - Sketch Series	Fred Armisen, Bill Hader, Erik Kenward, John Mulaney, Seth Meyers
	Primetime Emmy Awards	Outstanding Variety Sketch Series	Documentary Now!