Erin Lee Carr (born April 15, 1988) is an American documentary film director and producer. Her documentaries include Thought Crimes: The Case of the Cannibal Cop (2015), Mommy Dead and Dearest (2017), I Love You, Now Die: The Commonwealth vs. Michelle Carter (2019), At the Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastics Scandal (2019), as well as the 2021 Netflix documentary Britney vs Spears.
She is also an author for VICE and her memoir called All That You Leave Behind: A Memoir.
Early life and education Carr was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota to The New York Times media columnist David Carr and Anna Lee.
Carr and her twin sister, Meagan Carr, were born two and a half months early. Their parents lost custody of the twins because of their drug addiction. Carr and her sister went into foster care for a summer. When their father got out of rehab, he regained physical custody of the girls and in 1994 married Jill Rooney, who became Carr's step-mother.
In addition to her twin sister Meagan, Carr has a half-sister named Maddie. The family lived in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and then New Jersey.
In 2010, Carr graduated from the University of Wisconsin–Madison with a Bachelor of Arts in Communication Arts. In the Spring of 2010, Carr attended FAMU in Prague in the Czech Republic.
Career 2009–2014 In the summer of 2009, Carr was an intern at Fox Searchlight Pictures, working in the public relations department. In the fall of 2009, Carr worked as a Media Assistant at the Instructional Media Center in the Communication Arts Department at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In November 2010, she worked as an office production assistant on Lena Dunham's TV show, Girls.
Carr worked as a college intern at VICE. In 2010, she got a full-time job at VICE where she worked up to an Associate Producer position for Vice Media's Motherboard, In 2011, Carr co-produced the documentary Free The Network for Motherboard. The film depicted the efforts of the Free Network Foundation to provide Occupy Wall Street protestors in Zuccotti Park with Internet connectivity.
In 2012, Carr developed Spaced Out for Motherboard. Spaced Out had twelve videos, nine of which Carr helped create. In 2013, Carr developed My Life Online for VICE Motherboard. Carr also produced a documentary for VICE called Click. Print. Gun. about Cody Wilson, the owner of Defense Distributed. The film shows how 3D-printing is creating new issues with gun production. The documentary won a 2014 Webby Award.
In June 2013, she left VICE for Vox Media's The Verge to produce long and short stories. In November 2013, Carr became a freelance director for HBO Documentary Films.
2015–2021 In 2015, Variety included Carr as one of its "10 Documakers To Watch". Carr's first documentary for HBO, Thought Crimes: The Case of the Cannibal Cop premiered at the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival. The documentary received positive reviews and was a finalist for the 2016 Cinema Eye Honors in the non-fiction film for television category.
In May 2017, Carr's documentary film Mommy Dead and Dearest was released. It was an official selection for SXSW, Hot Docs and DocAviv and was one of the most-watched documentaries on HBO in 2017. In 2018, Carr directed an episode of the Netflix documentary series Dirty Money called "Drug Short" which examines how big pharmaceutical companies exploit patients seeking life saving drugs. Carr made the 2018 Forbes 30 under 30 list.
In 2019, Carr's two-part HBO documentary I Love You, Now Die: The Commonwealth Vs. Michelle Carter premiered at SXSW. It was also an official selection at Hot Docs and the Montclair Film Festival. Carr's film At the Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastics Scandal, premiered at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival,
Carr directed the limited series, How to Fix a Drug Scandal, that was released on Netflix on April 1, 2020.
After the February 2021 release and public reaction to Framing Britney Spears, a New York Times presentation on FX, Bloomberg announced that Carr was working on an additional documentary to be streamed on Netflix. Carr directed and produced the documentary Britney vs Spears about the Spears family and Britney Spears's attempts to challenge her 13-year conservatorship by her father Jamie Spears and former business manager Lou M. Taylor.
2022–present In 2023, Carr directed and produced The Ringleader: The Case of the Bling Ring.
In 2024, Carr directed and produced I Am Not a Monster: The Lois Riess Murders.
Carr, along with Lena Dunham, was the executive producer of Orgasm Inc: The Story of OneTaste, released on Netflix in November 2022. The film came out to mixed reviews and controversy, including hundreds of women and men claiming that that film used their image against their consent, filing a lawsuit against Netflix to disallow the film, signing petitions, and creating viral videos protesting the violation.
In 2024, Carr served as an executive producer on Perfect Wife: The Mysterious Disappearance of Sherri Papini. In the first week of the series release, 3.6 million viewers watched the series, making it Hulu's most viewed documentary. That same year, Carr directed and produced Fanatical: The Catfishing of Tegan and Sara.
In 2025, Carr was an executive producer on Trophy Wife: Murder on Safari. Carr was creator and executive producer on the 2025 scripted series Murdaugh: Death in the Family starring Jason Clarke and Patricia Arquette.
Bibliography In April 2019, Carr published a memoir called All That You Leave Behind: A Memoir for Random House. All That You Leave Behind started out as a self-published Medium article called Still Rendering that Carr wrote a year after her father's death. The book describes Carr's growth in her career as a documentary filmmaker and is a celebration of her father, David Carr, that includes emails and GChat and other records that documented her relationship with him.
Personal life Carr lives in New York City. Carr has discussed her struggles with alcohol and becoming sober. Erin is an openly queer artist.
Filmography Film YearTitleDirectorProducerNotes2012Free the Network: Hackers Take Back the WebDocumentaryFirst Animal to Survive in SpaceDocumentaryThe World's Hottest TaxidermistDocumentary 2012Click. Print. Gun.DocumentaryPicnic TableShort2015Thought Crimes: The Case of the Cannibal CopDocumentaryRemembering David CarrDocumentary; self; special thanks2017Mommy Dead and DearestDocumentaryWhirlybirdDocumentary2019I Love You, Now Die: The Commonwealth V. Michelle CarterDocumentaryAt the Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastics ScandalDocumentary2021Britney vs SpearsDocumentary2023The Ringleader: The Case of the Bling RingDocumentary2024 Stormy Documentary Fanatical: The Catfishing of Tegan and Sara Documentary 2025 Trophy Wife: Murder on Safari Documentary
TV series Numbers in directing credits refer to number of episodes.
YearTitleDirectorExecutiveProducerNotes2013My Life OnlineDocumentary seriesSpaced OutDocumentary series2018Dirty Money: Drug Short (1)Documentary series2020How to Fix a Drug Scandal (4)Documentary series2022Undercurrent: The Disappearance of Kim Wall (2)Documentary seriesThe Girl from PlainvilleScripted series2024 Perfect Wife: The Mysterious Disappearance of Sherri Papini Documentary series I Am Not a Monster: The Lois Riess Murders (2) Documentary series 2025 Murdaugh: Death in the Family (1) Scripted series; also co-creator
References
External links
Erin Lee Carr at Motherboard