EXCLUSIVE: We have your first look at Branson, HBO’s upcoming four-part documentary series on highflying tycoon Richard Branson, who built an empire around the Virgin brand.
Award-winning filmmaker Chris Smith directed the series, which premieres on HBO on Thursday, December 1, with new episodes debuting each of the following three Thursdays. The series will also be available to stream on HBO Max.
“Smith… takes us on an expansive and intimate 70-year journey, from Branson’s upbringing as the son of a spirited, tough-love mother in Britain, to his pursuits of extreme, personal daredevilry that serve both to grow his businesses’ brands and feed his insatiable, lifelong thirst for high-stakes adventure,” HBO said in a statement. “Branson reveals the ups and downs of a man driven by risk taking in both his business and personal life, reflecting on the costs and rewards of his lifelong, relentless optimism and boundary-pushing.”
The key interview for the series took place 16 days before Branson blasted off on a suborbital flight aboard a Virgin Galactic rocket, making him the “first passenger to reach space in his own spacecraft.” Branson beat Jeff Bezos to the punch, who reached the boundary of outer space on a Blue Origin rocket nine days after Branson’s mission (Bezos’s rocket propelled him to a somewhat higher altitude than Branson reached).
Branson’s outsized business achievements are explored in the series, as is his upbringing in a family that encouraged risk-taking.
“He thrives on jeopardy. It’s a continuation of his childhood,” Branson’s wife Joan notes in the trailer. Branson himself says, “Having suffered from dyslexia, having left school at 15, I had a lot to prove.”
It didn’t take him long to prove himself. He became “a millionaire by the age of 22 with the booming success of Virgin Records,” HBO commented. “His launch of the airline Virgin Atlantic soon followed, along with a myriad of other Virgin branded businesses with varying levels of success, culminating in the launch of Virgin Galactic, his commercial spaceflight company in 2004.”
Smith has become one of the most successful directors in documentary film, and he’s got an Oscar contender this year in Sr., his film about actor-director Robert Downey Sr. and his relationship with his son, Robert Downey Jr. Earlier in the year, Smith released the Netflix documentary series Bad Vegan, about a New York restaurant owner whose business collapsed after she got involved with a mystery man who claimed he could grant her dog immortality. Additional credits include the 2021 HBO documentary series 100 Foot Wave, about big wave surfer Garrett McNamara; 2018’s Fyre, about the Caribbean music event that turned into a fiasco; 2017’s Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond, about Jim Carrey’s star turn as comedian Andy Kaufman, and the 1999 documentary classic American Movie.
For Branson, Smith not only spoke with the mogul, but those closest to him: “…[T]he series features his colleagues and employees, as well as insights from both business journalists and industry experts,” HBO said. “Also included are intimate interviews with his family, including revealing excerpts from conversations with Joan, his wife of 33 years, his sisters, his daughter Holly and son Sam, and an extensive personal archive of his late mother Eve, whose lively presence in Branson’s life continues to loom large.”
The film is directed by Smith and executive produced by Kate Noble. For HBO, executive producers are Nancy Abraham and Lisa Heller, and senior producer is Tina Nguyen.
Watch the trailer above.
