The premiere dates for Evan Rachel Wood documentary Phoenix Rising have been announced by HBO. Watch the trailer below.
The film, which documents Wood’s decision to name Marilyn Manson as her alleged abuser, has two parts, titled Don’t Fall and Stand Up. Don’t Fall will air on Tuesday, March 15, while Stand Up arrives the following day.
Directed by Amy Berg, Phoenix Rising: Don’t Fall initially premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. The full film will be available to stream on HBO Max from March 15.
In the new trailer, Wood says, “I’m here today to talk about Brian Warner also known to the world as Marilyn Manson.”
The clip also features Wood’s mother, who describes Manson as “a predator” and her brother, who says “everyone was looking at Marilyn Manson and they weren’t looking at Brian Warner”. Elsewhere in the trailer, there’s footage of Wood testifying in front of lawmakers.
Last year, the actor publicly accused Manson, her former partner, of abuse, claiming that he started grooming her when she was a teenager and “horrifically abused me for years”.
The musician has denied all allegations by Wood and allegations by others, claiming that his accusers were “cynically and dishonestly seeking to monetise and exploit the #MeToo movement” by launching a “coordinated attack against him”.
After Wood publicly accused Manson, other women came forward with their own allegations against the rock star. Among them were Game Of Thrones actor Esme Bianco – who is suing Manson for alleged sexual assault, physical abuse and human trafficking – and his former assistant Ashley Walters, who is suing him for sexual assault, battery and harassment. Manson strongly denies these claims.
In the new film, Wood discusses the music video for Manson’s 2007 track ‘Heart-Shaped Glasses (When The Heart Guides The Hand)’, accusing him of “essentially raping” her on the shoot.
“It’s nothing like I thought it was going to be,” Wood said of shooting the video, which saw her and Manson having sex on set. “We’re doing things that were not what was pitched to me.”
In a statement to NME from Manson’s attorney Howard King, he said of the allegations: “Of all the false claims that Evan Rachel Wood has made about Brian Warner, her imaginative retelling of the making of the “Heart-Shaped Glasses” music video 15 years ago is the most brazen and easiest to disprove, because there were multiple witnesses.
“Evan was not only fully coherent and engaged during the three-day shoot but also heavily involved in weeks of pre-production planning and days of post-production editing of the final cut.
“The simulated sex scene took several hours to shoot with multiple takes using different angles and several long breaks in between camera setups. Brian did not have sex with Evan on that set, and she knows that is the truth.”
