Jussie Smollett’s new documentary, The Truth About Jussie Smollett?, drops this Friday, and the actor reveals how he felt when he first began receiving backlash after being accused of masterminding the infamous 2019 alleged hate crime hoax.
“I felt like I had died, and I was alive to see — and what people were saying was so kind, but it was too much for me,” he says in the upcoming documentary. “It made me very uncomfortable. It made me extremely embarrassed. It made me feel extremely emasculated.”
Smollett found himself at the center of a high‑profile legal saga when he claimed to have been assaulted in a racist and homophobic hate crime on a cold Chicago night back in January 2019. Authorities later alleged that he staged the attack himself, paying two actors, Olabinjo and Abimbola Osundairo, to play the part of the MAGA aggressors. They later testified against him that they had allegedly received $3500 for the performance.
After being found guilty, Smollett was sentenced to 150 days in jail in March 2022, and ordered to pay a $25,000 fine and more than $120,000 in restitution for overtime expenses incurred by the Chicago Police Department.
He was released on bail less than a week later and his conviction was overturned last year on a technicality.