Ohio and Michigan are setting their rivalry aside as Detroit’s Eminem and Akron’s LeBron James are producing a documentary about music piracy together for Paramount+.
The two-part series premiered at SXSW earlier this year and “details the fascinating, and often funny, inside story of the technology-driven disruption that changed music during the late-’90s and early-2000s,” according to The Hollywood Reporter. The doc looks at the technology that enabled millions of young people to quench their thirst for new music by just downloading it for free.
How Music Got Free features interviews from Em (who hilariously thought Yahoo! was a person), record exec Steve Stoute (who also serves as an executive producer), 50 Cent, Timbaland, Jimmy Iovine, Rocsi Diaz and Rhymefest, among others. They also speak with Dell Glover, who is often referred to as “Patient Zero of Internet Piracy” because he was one of the first factory workers to smuggle CDs out of a manufacturing plant.
Alexandria Stapleton directs the doc, which is produced by Warner Bros. Unscripted Television, LeBron’s SpringHill, Interscope Films and Shady Films.
The director had this to say about her approach: “As a filmmaker, I wanted to challenge the narrow lens of who we regard as tech innovators. How Music Got Free is a story that proves brilliant minds can be found in unlikely places, like the rural, forgotten factory town of Shelby, North Carolina.”
There’s also a book of the same name released in 2015 by Stephen Witt if you want to do your own research before the doc drops Tuesday, June 11. There’s still time.
