Netflix announced today two original documentaries Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold and Voyeur to premiere at the 55th New York Film Festival, and launch globally on Netflix later this year.

Author Joan Didion at home in Hollywood.

Across more than 50 years of essays, novels, screenplays, and criticism, Joan Didion has been our premier chronicler of the ebb and flow of America’s cultural and political tides with observations on her personal – and our own – upheavals, downturns, life changes, and states of mind. In the intimate, extraordinary documentary Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold, actor and director Griffin Dunne unearths a treasure trove of archival footage and talks at length to his “Aunt Joan” about the eras she covered and the eventful life she’s lived, including partying with Janis Joplin in a house full of L.A. rockers; hanging in a recording studio with Jim Morrison; and cooking dinner for one of Charles Manson’s women for a magazine story. Didion guides us through the sleek literati scene of New York in the 1950s and early ’60s, when she wrote for Vogue; her return to her home state of California for two turbulent decades; the writing of her seminal books, including Slouching Towards Bethlehem and The White Album; her film scripts, including The Panic in Needle Park; her view of 1980s and ’90s political personalities; and the meeting of minds that was her long marriage to writer John Gregory Dunne.

“How does one capture such a celebrated and prolific author while delivering something new for audiences to engage with?,” asked Lisa Nishimura, VP of Original Documentaries. “Griffin does a superb job of bringing us into intimate, one on one conversations with his ‘Aunt Joan’, examining how her struggle shaped her work, and how her work helped shape American culture.”

“It is a tremendous honor to have the opportunity to convey the life and work of my aunt, and literary icon, Joan Didion,” said director Griffin Dunne. “This documentary is a true labor of love and to partner with Netflix, who will help bring this to a global audience, is more than I could have hoped for when I started on this over 5 years ago. And to world premiere at NYFF, is just the icing on the cake.”

Voyeur

The Netflix original documentary will launch Oct. 27 and is directed by Dunne, and produced by Dunne, Mary Recine and Annabelle Dunne.

Voyeur follows Gay Talese — the 84-year-old giant of modern journalism — as he reports one of the most controversial stories of his career: a portrait of a Colorado motel owner, Gerald Foos. For decades, Foos secretly watched his guests with the aid of specially designed ceiling vents, peering down from an “observation platform” he built in the motel’s attic. He kept detailed journals of his guests’ most private moments — from the mundane to the shocking — but most of all he sought out, spied on, and documented one thing: strangers having sex. Talese’s insatiable curiosity leads him to turn his gaze to a man accustomed to being the watcher, exploring a tangle of ethical questions: What does a journalist owe to his subjects? How can a reporter trust a source who has made a career of deception? Who is really the voyeur?

“It’s an incredible honor to be able to add the next chapter in this fascinating story. NYFF is the perfect place to premiere this film about legendary New York journalist Gay Talese. And we’re very excited to release Voyeur globally with Netflix, to many new curious eyes.” said Voyeur directors Myles Kane and Josh Koury.

“Directors Myles Kane and Josh Koury deftly catapult us into one of the most highly complex and wily relationships between writer and subject, where the unremitting pursuit of the ultimate scoop and the ever-shifting memory of a serial voyeur collide and create an entirely new truth,” said Nishimura. “Kane & Koury have created an endlessly fascinating exploration of desire, control and the stories we tell

Voyeur

ourselves.”

Voyeur is a Netflix original documentary, in association with Impact Partners, produced by Brooklyn Underground Films in association with Chicago Media Project and Public Record. Voyeur will launch later this year on Netflix.