After earning Emmys for his works examining the murder of Emmett Till, the Black Panthers, and the Civil Rights movement, Stanley Nelson is turning his incisive lens toward another piece of Black history: the devastation caused by the crack epidemic and the war on drugs.

Below see a trailer for “Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy,” which will get a Netflix release on January 11, 2021. The trailer teases a documentary that examines the trajectory of cocaine from party drug of the rich to a devastating force in poor communities, as well a previously untold look at the role played by local, state, and federal governments in the war on drugs.

President Barack Obama bestowed Nelson with the National Humanities Medal in 2013. He earned a MacArthur Fellowship, also known as a genius grant, in 2002 for “synthesizing biography, history, and culture in signature portrayals of the African American experience.” Among his most notable work is “The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution” and “Freedom Riders.”

Nelson, who has directed some two-dozen documentaries dating back to the late ‘80s, said he aimed to more fully examine the history and impact of crack.

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12/14/20

IndieWire