2021 Directed by Cynthia Hill
An in-depth, intimate character portrait exploring the life and career and mysterious circumstances surrounding the tragic death of 90’s actress and rising star, Brittany Murphy. The series goes beyond the conspiracy theories and headlines, featuring new interviews by those closest to Brittany and new archival footage.
Jason Blum Chris McCumber Jeremy Gold Mary Lisio James Buddy Day Paul Harrison Jeff Nucera Jennifer O'Connell
What Happened, Brittany Murphy
i’ve loved brittany and her work for many years, and like most people, they would expect some bit of closure from this especially with the title itself being “what happened, brittany murphy?”
considering this is from blumhouse productions, a studio that has made films like the purge and the conjuring, i of course did not go into this with much expectations aside from just the reiteration of how simon monjack is an asshole.
anyone who’s done any form of research on brittany murphy’s tragedy already knows all of information and this doc basically isn’t anything innovative or unique at all, just a shame. i think the worst part of it had to be having perez hilton, who publicly humiliated brittany in…
if your documentary features true crime youtubers spewing their inane theories while they do their makeup in front of a ring light, it’s not a documentary
lazy, irresponsible, and actively harmful. brittany murphy deserves better than this
- We're gonna get out of here.
- Where are we gonna go?
- I don't know, someplace where there's trees and sky, we can breathe the fucking air. Some place that's not so fucked up.
A lovely, talented, kind, smart, beautiful woman who you saw in so many famous movies dead at 32 years of age. HBO’s recent documentary about a celebrity tragedy covers the circumstances of Brittany Murphy’s death and the mystery surrounding it. I really appreciated how many people they interviewed - including those close to Brittany and people who handled the investigation. I was surprised to see Kathy Najimy, who was great on Veep, here and find out that she was a close friend of Murphy's.…
one of the most disgusting, exploitative, salacious documentaries i've ever seen. i'm so appalled that hbo max picked up a project this sloppy and speculative and just fucking gross. like you're spending air time on perez hilton in 2021 for WHAT, you're giving space to commentary youtubers speculating for WHAT—you're doing all this while having a woman talk about her trauma on camera for the first time and including interviews with people close to brittany murphy that talk about her with such respect and care. this could have been a documentary that celebrated what made her such a special artist and person without positing unfounded theories about her tragic death. fuck everyone involved with producing this project.
Personally, I really disliked this documentary; if you can even call it that.
I thought it grossly used the mindless popularity of the 'true crime' genre to sensationalize her death. Perhaps even further, the popularity of serial storytelling... why is it two episodes? Silly.
I thought it felt very cheap.
I thought it felt like the celebrity gossip-mongering, of the time she died in, trying to simultaneously repent for its sins while justifying itself.
Honestly, it felt like what a celebrity gossip rag thinks a documentary of someone's life should be, and it's gross. Like someone stitched together every single sensational article written about her into one portraiture... as if that was the totality of her life.
It does attempt…
Don’t watch this.
It’s gross, it’s nasty. It does NOTHING to explain the environment that Brittany was a star in and what the media and the producing companies demanded of girls like her.
They allow nasty celeb journalists to defend and proudly discuss their nasty tactics for exploiting this young woman without an inch of criticism.
And the way they use you tubers as some kind of cute or funny way to interweave the story!? It’s nasty!! It’s exploitative and unnecessary.
It’s also unnecessary to try and give Brittany a voice using characters and scenes she filmed it’s abhorrent.
Brittany was a fantastic artist who deserved so much better.
seeing brittany murphy on screen is one of the most delightful experiences anyone could ever have. So that’s why her death to this day for some reason doesn’t even seem real.
The circumstances leading up to her death were so preventable that it’s just a shock that no one did anything about it. such a sad story and such a fucked up marriage.
I hope she’s at peace and we truly miss you Brittany
i wanted to gain something from this. i’m not sure what. i know true closure isn’t possible in circumstances of this nature especially this long after the events but i still went into it thinking i would leave with something because i adore brittany murphy and her passing is a tragedy i still think about to this day. turns out, all i came out of this with was anger.
i can overlook the horrendous editing but including perez hilton like a valid voice when he was an instigator of the media shitstorm she went through in her final months and letting simon’s delusional mother defend him moments after his former fiancé spoke about how he’s a violent rapist is unforgivable.…
It's very funny and extremely normal that Perez Hilton's entire career (and I am using that term loosely) has been rendered to being weepy in documentaries about people he indirectly, sometimes directly, hurt.
Crocodile tears! Fuck you.
it’s literally so sick how they actually decided it was a good idea to bring perez hilton into this just for him to justify himself and give him a good image but brittany murphy deserved so much better and really was too good for this world and it’s so sad to see her downfall from being with simon because she really was one of the best actresses and people in hollywood
the shane dawson inspired editing choice of constantly including random movie clips and no-name youtubers* as filler…no words
* = everyone but the best true crime yter and (respectfully) milf stephanie harlowe
