Following the release earlier this year of the Netflix documentary film Pamela: A love story, another blonde bombshell from the ’90s is the subject of a new documentary from the streaming giant that debuts next week.
Anna Nicole Smith: You Don’t Know Me, from director Ursula Macfarlane, brings the documentarian’s lens to the life, career, death, and secrets of Vickie Lynn Hogan — the model and actress better known as Anna Nicole Smith, who first appeared in Playboy in 1992 and who, for a time, was the embodiment of the “breathless bimbo stereotype” (in Netflix’s words). “I want audiences to understand that Anna Nicole was a complex woman,” Macfarlane said in a promotional interview with the streamer.
“She was someone who above all else wanted to be a good mother and a free-spirited exuberant woman who wanted to live life on her own terms. But her story is also a cautionary tale about how the desire for the American dream can swallow you up and spit you out, blurring your self-image and (making) you lose sight of your authentic self.”
Netflix’s new documentary promises material including never-before-seen footage, home movies, and interviews, and it hits Netflix on May 16. The interviews include a conversation with one of Smith’s oldest friends named Missy, who offers insight into who her friend really was and what she meant to her family and loved ones.
Unlike Netflix’s Pamela Anderson documentary — which hit the streamer at the end of January — the subject of this new film has since passed away (Smith died in 2007). This is to say, she’s not around to correct the record herself or add new insight and perspective to what people might assume they know about her life. Even so, Netflix’s Anna Nicole Smith documentary will still add yet another release to an already long and growing list of compelling documentary titles that debuted this year and which re-examine big events and famous names — in addition to showing people another side of the world they thought they knew. They include:
