Alanis Morissette has hit out at a new documentary based on her life.
Helmed by Alison Klayman, ‘Jagged’ focuses on the singer-songwriter’s career trajectory, which began at a young age, and premiered this week at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Following its debut, the hitmaker issued a statement to Pitchfork, opposing the feature and accusing the team behind the documentary of having a “salacious agenda”.
Insisting she would not be attending the premiere, Morissette said: “I agreed to participate in a piece about the celebration of ‘Jagged Little Pill’’s 25th anniversary, and was interviewed during a very vulnerable time [while in the midst of my third postpartum depression during lockdown’.
“I was lulled into a false sense of security and their salacious agenda became apparent immediately upon my seeing the first cut of the film. This is when I knew our visions were in fact painfully diverged.
This was not the story I agreed to tell. I sit here now experiencing the full impact of having trusted someone who did not warrant being trusted.
“I have chosen not to attend any event around this movie for two reasons: one is that I am on tour right now.
The other is that, not unlike many ‘stories’ and unauthorised biographies out there over the years, this one includes implications and facts that are simply not true.
“While there is beauty and some elements of accuracy in this/my story to be sure – I ultimately won’t be supporting someone else’s reductive take on a story much too nuanced for them to ever grasp or tell.”
According to reports, the Ironic singer claims in the documentary that she was raped by five different men when she was 15 years old and, while she reported the incidents to “a few people… it kind of fell on deaf ears”.
Despite the backlash, Klayman previously admitted she hopes the singer will eventually embrace the documentary.
“It was a privilege to make this film and I’m really proud of it,” she insisted. “Hopefully there will be other opportunities in the future for her to come to film events.”
‘Jagged’ is scheduled to be released on November 19.
