Morgan Spurlock (1970-2024)
Morgan Spurlock, the man behind the fast food documentary "Super Size Me", has died after a private battle with cancer. He was 53. Spurlock's career as a director has been varied and erratic. His documentary changed people's minds about fast food and how it affects them. It also prompted many fast food outlets to improve their healthier options.
A native of Parkesburg, West Virginia, the future filmmaker grew up in Beckley, where he attended Woodrow Wilson High School. He completed his studies at New York University in 1993.
In his first movie, "Super Size Me", Spurlock examines obesity and unhealthy food choices in America by experimenting on himself and chronicling the effects of an all-fast food diet. He ate only McDonald's for a month with dozens of Big Macs and Chicken McNuggets and drank gallons of cola. This unhealthy diet gained him 25 pounds of weight, and he claims that it had damaged his liver. McDonald's described Spurlock's eating habits as "unrealistic", but after the controversy surrounding the film, they scrapped their supersized portions. However, the film earned the Best Documentary Feature Oscar nomination and the first Writers Guild of America Award for Best Documentary Screenplay.
His success with "Super Size Me" encouraged Spurlock to do several documentaries. Such films include "Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden?", "POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold", a One Direction concert feature and "Super Size Me 2".
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