Women and Hollywood spoke with Caroline Waterlow, producer of the highly anticipated “O.J.: Made in America,” one of Sundance 2016’s biggest hits. Described as a masterpiece by many critics, the film, which clocks in at nearly eight hours, depicts the rise and fall of former football superstar turned prison inmate O.J. Simpson.

The wildly ambitious doc remains riveting throughout its lengthy run time, and poses as many questions as it answers. “O.J.: Made in America” is a rewarding investment that’s sure to keep viewers engaged.

Waterlow shared her thoughts on the murder trial’s polarizing verdict, how race influenced perceptions of the case, and the sexist backlash against Marcia Clark.

“O.J.: Made in America” will air as a five-part event, starting with Part 1 on June 11 on ABC, followed by the additional Parts 2–5 of the film on ESPN the week of June 14–18.

W&H: How and why did you get involved with “O.J.: Made in America”? Did you have any reservations about telling this story?

CW: The director, Ezra Edelman, and I were colleagues on a film for HBO several years ago, “Brooklyn Dodgers: The Ghosts of Flatbush.” We also both worked on our friend’s documentary “Cutie and the Boxer,” so we had some experience working together. When he approached me to join him on this epic project, I did think hard, knowing that the workload would be huge. We were starting from scratch forming a production company, too.

But I jumped in pretty quickly knowing that ESPN and Ezra wanted real context, history, and depth — that is what you pine for when making historical docs! In our first conversation about the project in 2014, I asked Ezra, “Really? Do we need more about O.J.?” He said, “It’s not just about O.J. — it’s about everything!”

Simpson has been the subject of countless books, articles, and docs, but “Made in America” manages to feel entirely fresh. Not only is the doc not sensationalist, it almost feels anti-sensationalist in its approach to telling this historically-based story. It’s well over an hour before the murders are addressed in the doc, and the run time exceeds seven-and-a-half hours — you’re digging really deep and painting a picture not just of Simpson, but the United States. How would you describe the tone of “Made in America”? And its aims?

CW: I am so pleased to hear you say anti-sensationalist, as that was definitely the goal: a sober look at all angles.

I do think a lot of the direction stemmed from the fact that this was focused originally to be around the 20th anniversary of the verdict from October 1995. So right away the focus was on “the verdict.” And what everyone — of all ages — seems to know and remember is that the reactions to the verdict were very divided along racial lines. White people were shocked and black people were celebrating — though of course there were exceptions, those who defied these categories.

So knowing that we were going to get to this major story point made us want to build the history and context to get to the verdict that we know is coming, but to experience it in a different way. What was the confluence of events in this time and place that led to this verdict and the reaction to it?

Building O.J.’s history and LA’s history to intertwine and culminate in that moment became Ezra’s focus. He set about it that way, and editorially it started to take shape.

W&H: “Made in America” addresses how and why black and white Americans — and jurors — were so divided on the case. Someone in the doc says, “The reality of black America and white America — two totally separate worlds.” “Made in America” really helps illustrate this point. Do you think the media ignored or oversimplified racial tensions and their impact on how people viewed the case — and Simpson?

CW: The nature of the format ESPN gave us meant we had the time and space to explore these things; nightly news does not. Media coverage in general, particularly of a trial featuring a celebrity, is not known for subtlety and exposition — and we talk about this in the film, too. I think it’s all part of the media journey we have all been on for the last 20 years.

There are benefits to revisiting stories with the passage of time, which is why retelling stories for different generations is an important thing. Now we can see the context and all the connections and repeated patterns; maybe it was all too close in 1995.

We were so taken with the fact we had the cameras in the courtroom, so the immediacy of the trial drama distracted us from the bigger picture. I don’t think it was media ignoring it per se, but maybe not able to see it in sharp relief.

W&H: What surprised you most about Simpson? How has your own perception of him — and the case — evolved from the time of the trial, 1994–95, to the present day?

CW: It was the summer between my sophomore and junior year in college when the Bronco chase happened, and then the verdict was in the fall of my senior year, so I remember all of that well. To me, O.J. was a big media personality — from movies, TV commercials, commentating as a former football star. I did not know him from the years he played in Buffalo. I was a bit too young and I did not grow up in an American football-loving house.

The early O.J. years were fascinating for me to learn about — just how amazing, talented, and self-possessed he was. Clearly he was going to be a star. You don’t have to know too much about football to get it; when you see him speed past everyone so gracefully and with such ease, you are in awe of him. And he is also totally gorgeous. So you see how potent it must have been to be around him then, and how much he was put on a pedestal — and at a time when monetizing and marketing that status was really starting to take off.

I also had not known that O.J. had been approached, or recruited, to join activists in the Civil Rights movement — and that he chose a different and specific path for himself. And had his reasons for that.

With regard to my own perceptions evolving after working on this, I think it’s all a lot more complicated and layered than we all like to think, in terms of the outcome of the trial and O.J.’s persona through the years.

I do feel differently about the trial now, hearing the perspectives of so many of the people involved — prosecution, defense, jurors.

I served on a criminal jury once and I started to think about this case more from that perspective than from the media coverage.

W&H: A number of influential figures from the case were interviewed for the documentary, including head prosecutor Marcia Clark and District Attorney Gil Garcetti. Who would you have loved to include that didn’t participate? And how did you make up for their absence?

CW: I think Marcia Clark’s co-counsel Christopher Darden is the person that Ezra would have most liked to interview who is not in the film. He is obviously a major player in the dynamics of the trial so naturally we would have preferred to include his first-person accounts. He was very gracious about declining us and I can certainly understand that participating in an in-depth documentary is not everyone’s choice.

Darden is very present in the archival material so we were able to rely on that and the accounts of his colleagues who worked with him.

W&H: Garcetti appeared in person at Hot Docs and emphasized that he always saw the case from the angle of domestic abuse. In the doc, we hear from an extremely unsympathetic juror who blamed Brown for sticking around, suggesting that she was responsible for her own fate. Do you feel like this aspect of the trial would play differently in the current climate? Domestic abuse is still unfortunately treated like a taboo subject, and remains under-reported, but it seems like there is more understanding and empathy for those affected than there was 20 years ago. (Editor’s note: This interview was conducted prior to the ugly, sexist, biphobic backlash following Amber Heard’s allegations of domestic abuse by Johnny Depp.)

CW: I am not a domestic violence expert, so I am not sure I can speculate on how this trial would play out in a different time and place. So many things are different, and other things aren’t different at all.

What I can say is that whether it’s the subject of a trial 20 years ago, the media coverage of men accused of this in 2016, or it’s us trying to tell an effective story about it in a documentary, the topic of violence against women is everywhere and will only be helped from having more and more information revealed and stories told.

[We need this practice] elevated to one viewed not as an uncomfortable “women’s issue,” but one that’s viewed as a major public health crisis. In 1995 it was certainly not viewed that way — and it is still not seen through that lens now.

W&H: “Made in America” and FX’s recent “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story” both depict Clark as more multi-dimensional — and significantly more competent — than most media coverage did during the time of the trial. Do you feel like sexism played a part in how Clark was perceived? Was she unfairly judged for being considered “unlikeable”?

CW: I do think comments and coverage of Marcia Clark were sexist at the time of the trial, and I probably participated in it without really analyzing what was happening. How many times did we all comment on her hair, perm, and clothes? No one cared about Barry Scheck’s hair or F. Lee Bailey’s suit!

Of course a lot of that is the same now — women running for office still deal with endless comments about likeability, clothes, and looks in a way that male candidates do not have to answer to. I wish I knew when that will change!

When I think about the fact Marcia Clark was managing this case and that she had two small children at the time and was going through a divorce, I can’t imagine handling that kind of stress.

W&H: Have you seen “American Crime Story”? If so, what’d you think of it?

CW: I only watched a few episodes of the FX series, only because I was buried in work trying to finish our doc. There are a lot of TV shows and films I need to catch up on!

For the episodes I did watch, I could see they had stuck close to Jeffrey Toobin’s book, which is a very good resource, and they had really done their research in terms of the actual look of things, locations, and characters. I thought Sarah Paulson’s performance was excellent, and Marcia Clark herself has said so too in a lot of recent press.

W&H: The doc is a real conversation-starter. What are some of the most interesting discussions it’s sparked with audiences?

CW: The consistent comments and discussions I hear are from younger people — under 30 — who just know nothing about O.J.’s origins and career, and who don’t know much about the trial. They know he is in jail now and they know a trial happened, but they didn’t know why it was such a big deal.

People under 30 have also seen athletes endorsing products and making lots of money that way — crossing over into pop culture so much that celebrity drives everything now. So knowing there was a time when that really took off and that O.J. was a big part of creating that culture, I think people find interesting.

Also, some of the examples of events we show that took place in LA between the police and the black community were things that, outside of LA, many of us did not know about. We know about Rodney King probably the most, but other incidents prior to that are less known and were not seen as connected somehow. Of course activists on these issues saw the connections — but not the mainstream public.

But now we see the chronology and then think about what is going on now in American cities. After watching the film, people tell me that they are shocked at the eerie sameness of these topics.

W&H: What advice do you have for other women producers?

CW: I think my advice would be to seek out and step up to big responsibility jobs when you have the chance. I am grateful for the path I have taken and the amazing people I have worked with who have believed in me, Ezra Edelman included. But I think I probably stayed too long in certain positions and held myself back because I wanted to be perfect at everything, and I was worried I didn’t know enough: “Oh I can’t do that, I have only been an AP for 8 years!” Yeah, you can do it. You just have to have the confidence that you will have the sense to figure things out; you can take on a lot more than you thought.

In production, unpredictable stuff is thrown at you all the time. No one is fully prepared for every eventuality and it’s about how you handle things under pressure. So, my advice is if someone offers you a crazy, never–thought-this-was-the-plan opportunity, take it! Men do it everyday. But don’t be afraid to negotiate!