CNN and CNN+ have set an April 24 premiere date for Daniel Roher’s feature documentary Navalny, an edge-of-your-seat thriller about Russian dissident Alexei Navalny and fellow investigators trying to unmask Russian security agents who allegedly poisoned him in August 2020 for opposing Vladimir Putin.
Navalny will bow on CNN in North America and on the CNN+ streaming service in the U.S. The TV debuts for the doc follow Warner Bros. and Fathom giving Navalny a special release in more than 800 theaters on April 11-12 amid a higher profile for Navalny as a Kremlin critic and anti-corruption campaigner after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Especially as Americans are looking to understand the broader context for the tragic events happening in Eastern Europe, we are able to offer Navalny to television and streaming audiences,” Courtney Sexton, senior vp for CNN Films, said in a statement on Friday.
CNN Films and HBO Max announced they were partnering on Navalny just before the doc premiered to critical and audience acclaim at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the audience award in the U.S. Documentary competition and the Festival Favorite Award.
Roher’s doc interweaves interviews with Navalny, Navalny’s family, eyewitnesses to key events and includes reporting from the investigative news organizations Bellingcat and CNN. Navalny today sits in a grim Russian prison cell for his political opposition, with no release in sight.
Navalny is produced by Odessa Rae, Diane Becker, Melanie Miller and Shane Boris, with Amy Entelis, Sexton and Maria Pevchikh executive producing.
