Lilith Fair documentary to feature Sarah McLachlan, Erykah Badu, Sheryl Crow and more

Canadian singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan has authorised a feature documentary from CBC and director Ally Pankiw, chronicling the all-female music festival, Lilith Fair.

The first Lilith Fair, which McLachlan founded, kicked off on 5th July, 1997 with the aim to defy a male-dominated music industry that often excluded women from radio airplay and having a majority of headline festival slots.

Over a quarter century later, Dan Levy’s Not a Real Production Company and Elevation Pictures are co-producing Lilith Fair, including interviews with McLachlan, Bonnie Raitt, Sheryl Crow, Erykah Badu, Natalie Merchant, Mýa, Jewel, Indigo Girls, Emmylou Harris, Brandi Carlile and Olivia Rodrigo.

The original ladies-first Lilith Fair toured from 1997 to 1999 and attracted artists like Crow, Sinéad O'Connor, Tracy Chapman, Fiona Apple and Liz Phair. It went on to catalyse the careers of such performers as Missy Elliott, The Chicks, Nelly Furtado and Christina Aguilera.

The documentary draws inspiration from the 2019 Vanity Fair article ‘Building a Mystery: An Oral History of Lilith Fair’, by writers Jessica Hopper, Sasha Geffen and Jenn Pelly. Lilith Fair also pulls from over 600 hours of never-before-seen archival footage, interviews and stories from fans, festival organisers and artists of Lilith Fair, an antidote to mainstream tours like Lollapalooza and Warped Tour dominated by male artists.

Despite the festival’s commercial success over an initial three summers, the documentary recounts how the Lilith Fair tour saw its first female headliners often marginalised and the event itself become a cultural punchline on Saturday Night Live. The takeaway of Lilith Fair - that female artists could have their own stage and safe space on which to perform - underscores the Canadian documentary.

“Lilith Fair exemplifies the ‘cool older sister’ of the music industry, who already knows the joys and nightmares of being a woman and tries to make the path a little bit easier for future generations,” director Ally Pankiw said in a statement. “I want to give a deeper understanding of the festival to the young female, nonbinary and queer musicians and music fans who picked up a guitar or tickets to a concert for the first time because Lilith showed them how.”

Pankiw directed the first season of the Netflix dramedy Feel Good, starring Mae Martin, as well as episodes of the Hulu series Shrill and The Great. Canadian broadcaster, CBC, will premiere the feature Lilith Fair during the 2025-26 season.

“What Sarah built with that festival changed so much for so many people. And while it is now seen as an odds-defying success story, it was an uphill battle every step of the way. And there is a lot to be learned from that story,” Dan Levy commented in his own statement. “I’m thrilled to join Sarah on this adventure and am excited for everyone to understand just how revolutionary Lilith Fair really was.”

The film is also supported by McLachlan’s Lilith Fair co-founders Terry McBride, Dan Fraser and Marty Diamond, who will executive produce alongside Lynne Stopkewich, Jessica Fraser and Dean English.