Tupac & Afeni Shakur Documentary Series Coming To FX

Six months after CEO John Landgraf revealed plans for FX to make a greater push into the unscripted space, the basic cable network is delivering on that promise.

On Tuesday, ahead of Landgraf's time at the Television Critics Association's summer press tour, FX revealed its first-ever documentary slate, consisting of five shows and a feature doc, all of which are set to join The Weekly at the cabler.

Picked up to series are: a project exploring Tupac Shakur and his mother and activist Afeni Shakur from The Defiant Ones director Allen Hughes; a Blumhouse TV-produced six-party entry based on Errol Morris' novel A Wilderness of Error; LGBTQ civil rights foray Pride, from Christine Vachon; Hip Hop Untold, an exploration of power brokers in the music industry; and The Most Dangerous Animal of All, about a man who comes to learn his father is a serial killer. Also joining the slate is the feature doc Women in Comedy, which explores the changing landscape of, well, women in comedy.

“FX has long sought to give artists a platform to showcase their individual, uncompromising vision and its new docuseries and features are an opportunity to extend that ambition in our collaboration with non-fiction talent,” said FX original programming president Nick Grad. “It’s been tremendously rewarding to partner with The New York Times and Hulu on The Weekly, which has excelled creatively and is hitting series-high ratings. Under the guidance of FX’s Jonathan Frank and J.J. Klein, we are now honored to partner with these new teams to create docuseries and features that will join FX’s legacy of fearless and groundbreaking programming.”

The slate arrives after FX is making the most of a cash infusion from new corporate parent Disney to expand its roster of originals. In a February interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Landgraf said he hoped to double the number of scripted originals (from 14 in 2018 to possibly 28 within three to five years) while also building an unscripted slate that included eight to 12 shows. That will also help FX continue to be competitive at the Emmys as its flagship scripted series continue to run on an untraditional schedule. (FX's Emmy winner Atlanta, renewed earlier Tuesday, won't begin production until spring 2020, at which point it will have been off the air for two years.)

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