Evan Rachel Wood speaks out in heartbreaking detail about her past relationship with rock star Marilyn Manson in part one of the HBO documentary Phoenix Rising, which made its world premiere on Sunday at Sundance.
Wood first publicly named Manson, whose legal name is Brian Warner, as the person she had previously accused of domestic violence and sexual abuse in February 2021. Phoenix Rising, directed by Amy Berg, is Wood’s attempt to tell the full story of what happened to her, from start to finish, in her own words.
Warner has consistently denied ever committing any abuses against Wood or anyone else.
“The way the press handled this story for many, many years is shameful. And it’s time to finally tell the whole story and for the narrative to change and for the survivors to take back ownership of their stories,” Wood said in a Q&A following the documentary’s Sundance premiere.
“I’m an intensely private person, and having a documentary made about me is truly the last thing that I would ever want, if you know me. But it’s time for me to tell the truth. It’s time for me to finally tell my side. I can’t have it told for me anymore. And people are going to believe whatever they’re going to believe. It’s not my job to convince people I’m not lying. It’s my job to tell the truth, and that’s what I’ve done.”
Wood and Manson dated from 2006 to 2011 beginning when Wood was 18 and Manson was 37. In 2018, Wood testified before a House Judiciary subcommittee that she had been physically and sexually abused by an unnamed person, including being starved, beaten, and physically threatened.
In 2019, Wood testified again in front of the California Senate Public Safety committee on behalf of the Phoenix Act, which successfully extended the statute of limitations for survivors of domestic violence.
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Phoenix Rising is as much about her experiences with Manson as it is about her activism work with the Phoenix Coalition. But Wood explains in the documentary why it took her many years to feel comfortable finally naming Manson.
“I don’t remember what it feels like to not be scared. I will never be the same,” Wood says in Phoenix Rising, which began filming in 2020 before Wood had made her allegations against Manson public. “I’m still terrified to name Brian publicly. I want to name him, it’s all I want to do. I have received a number of threatening messages saying to shut my mouth, people know where I live. Brian also made it clear that if I ever said anything, he would come after me. He once told me he would fuck up my whole family from the bottom up and he would start with my dad. I have a child and it’s really scary.”
Director Amy Berg hopes that the documentary will help to heal other survivors of domestic violence — and spur change in Hollywood.
“I think overall, this was always about identifying patterns and trying to educate people to come out and get out of a situation that’s dangerous… I think Evan’s story is so heroic that hopefully, it will offer support for those who are suffering in silence,” Berg said during the Q&A.
“This is something that’s been going on for decades, and we’ve been memorializing and worshipping a person who was doing horrendous things to his victims. And I think that the industry needs to take inventory of themselves now, because we ran into a lot of stumbling blocks even in just trying to clear music in this film because people are still protecting Brian, and they don’t want to participate in anything that might upset him. And I think that as an industry we need to take account at this point, not just for Brian Warner, for all the people who are being abusive towards women and men and children in the industry.”
Part 1 and 2 of Phoenix Rising will be released on HBO later this year.
Main Image: Evan Rachel Wood appears in Phoenix Rising by Amy Berg, an official selection of the Special Screenings section at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Olivia Fougeirol.
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