Add “The Jerry Springer Show” to the ongoing list of ’90s pop culture being reexamined through a modern lens. Netflix is moving forward with “Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action,” a two-part docuseries about the show that will premiere globally on the streamer Jan. 7, 2025.
The docuseries comes from director Luke Sewell, who previously worked on “Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King” and “Bad Sport” for Netflix. The series promises to tell the story of “The Jerry Springer Show” “as it’s never been told before.” That will include first-hand testimonies from show insiders, including producers and former guests of the daytime talk show. The series also promises to uncover “some darker truths.”
“A murkier picture begins to emerge of the destruction it caused, raising renewed questions about who was responsible, and how far things should go in the name of entertainment,” a press release for the upcoming series reads.
“Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action” is produced by Minnow Films. Sophie Jones, Alicia Kerr and Sophie Leonard serve as executive producers with Catherine Murnane serving as a producer.
“The Jerry Springer Show” premiered in 1991. In its first season, the show wasn’t well watched owing to its focus on political issues. But after the show was overhauled to focus on controversial topics such as cheating and incest as well as on-camera fighting, profanity and near nudity, its ratings took off. The widely watched daytime talk show ran for nearly three decades and was first produced by Multimedia, Inc. then NBCUniversal. In 2018, NBCUniversal ended production of the show, leading to its conclusion after 27 seasons.
Though the series was always negatively viewed by critics, it forever changed the television landscape. “The Jerry Springer Show” paved the way for a more extreme form of reality and daytime television that pushed the envelope on what was acceptable to air on television. At the same time, the show left behind a legacy of controversies from Nancy Campbell-Panitz, who was murdered by her ex-husband after an appearance on the show, to accusations the series glamorized violence. Representatives for the show later denied the series had any involvement in the Campbell-Panitz tragedy.
Springer died in April of 2023 of “a brief illness.” He was 79 at the time of his death.
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