CNN’s Pill-Mill Doc ‘American Pain’ Sets Premiere Date (Exclusive)

CNN’s American Pain, investigative doc maker Darren Foster’s profile of pill mill kingpins Chris and Jeff George, is set for a Feb. 5 premiere.  

American Pain had its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival as it traces the rise and fall of identical twins from Florida who trafficked over $500 million in opioid pills while running sham pain clinics. The documentary will also stream on CNN.com and CNN OTT and mobile apps, or CNNgo where available.

“The George brothers were the biggest players among a colorful cast of characters who made millions during Florida’s pill mill boom. Together with their trusty suppliers — a pharmaceutical industry pumping out billions of powerful and addictive pills — they fueled the worst drug epidemic in American history,” director Foster, who conducted jailhouse interviews with the twin brothers, said in a statement.

Weaving together hundreds of hours of FBI wiretap recordings and undercover videos, American Pain exposes the corruption and violence behind oxy pill mills. Like earlier films such as Hulu’s limited series Dopesick, Alex Gibney’s Crime of the Century and Laura Poitras’s All The Beauty and the Bloodshed, Foster’s doc also tells the wider story of America’s opioid crisis, where the rise in prescriptions of pills like OxyContin for pain led to abuse of both prescription and non-prescription drugs and fueled illicit sales of heroin and fentanyl. 

“Through Darren’s carefully-researched and compelling film, it is urgent to amplify this important issue that continues to impact Americans across the country,” Amy Entelis, executive vp for talent and content development for CNN Worldwide, added in a statement.  

The CNN documentary is produced by Motto Pictures, Muck Media, and Fishbowl Films for CNN Films and HBO Max, in association with TIME Studios.

Julie Goldman, Christopher Clements and Carolyn Hepburn of Motto Pictures are producers, alongside Diane Becker of Fishbowl Films.  Entelis and Courtney Sexton of CNN Films are executive producers.