Documentary-maker Morgan Spurlock, the director of films including Super Size Me and Where in the World Is Osama bin Laden? died on Thursday aged 53.
His family announced in a statement that he “passed away peacefully surrounded by family and friends in New York from complications of cancer.”
His brother Craig Spurlock said: “It was a sad day, as we said goodbye to my brother Morgan. Morgan gave so much through his art, ideas, and generosity. The world has lost a true creative genius and a special man. I am so proud to have worked with him.”
Super Size Me, released in 2004, was his first film as director, and marked a new direction in accessible, personalised gimmick-oriented documentary-making. In it, Spurlock said he planned to eat only McDonald’s food for a month, and chart the effect on his physical and mental health. It was nominated for the best documentary Oscar and was credited with raising awareness of the US’s obesity crisis. A sequel, Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken!, in 2017, saw Spurlock running his own fast food restaurant to examine the way the food industry had changed since the first film.
Born and raised in West Virginia, Spurlock earned a BFA at New York University and created the stunt webcast I Bet You Will in 2002, which subsequently became a TV show. After Super Size Me’s success, Spurlock made Where in the World Is Osama bin Laden?, in which he attempted to track down the then-fugitive leader of al-Qaida. He also contributed to the 2010adaptation of Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner’s Freakonomics (with a segment asking if names influence people’s lives) and POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold in 2011, investigating product placement. In 2013 Spurlock released One Direction: This Is Us, a film shot in 3D featuring the British boyband in concert and behind the scenes.
Spurlock also directed the TV show The Simpsons 20th Anniversary Special – In 3-D! On Ice!, shown in 2010. Arguably his most successful TV work was the FX series 30 Days, which ran between 2005 and 2008, in which participants took on an unlikely task or lifestyle, such as a devout Christian living with a Muslim family, or Spurlock himself living on minimum wage.
In 2017 Spurlock published an open letter in which he admitted sexual misconduct and resigned from his production company Warrior Poets.
Spurlock was formerly married to Alexandra Jamieson and Sara Bernstein, and had two sons Laken and Kallen.
