HBO Revisits the Louds for An American Family Movie
The Loud Family
America's first reality TV family is coming back to the small screen.
HBO and executive producer Gavin Polone have teamed up for the TV movie Cinema Verite, a behind-the-scenes look at the Loud family and An American Family, the groundbreaking PBS reality series that featured the family, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Shari Springer Berman and Bob Pulcini (American Splendor) will direct the film, written by David Seltzer (The Omen).
Decades before Jon and Kate Gosselin aired their drama on national television, the seven-member Loud family gave America its first taste of familial dysfunction. Created by Oscar-winning documentary filmmakers Alan and Susan Raymond, the 12-episode series premiered in 1973 and generated controversy for shattering the rosy façade of middle-class suburbia.
Watch clips from other PBS programs
Notable moments included Pat Loud asking her husband, Bill, for a divorce, and their eldest son, Lance, coming out. Lance Loud died in 2001 from liver failure caused by hepatitis C and HIV.
In 1983, HBO and the Raymonds collaborated on a reunion special with the family called An American Family Revisited: The Louds 10 Years Later. Twenty years later, PBS aired Lance Loud!: A Death in an American Family, which featured the family, sans brother Grant, in the months prior to Lance's death.
The Raymonds will serve as consultants on the new film.
Discussions for casting are underway.