• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, May 8, 2025

Mother’s Day weekend is an appropriate time to premiere a new, multipart documentary about the Judds, a family of a mother and two daughters that encapsulates the complexities of mother-daughter relationships.

“The Judds: Truth Be Told” totals four hours, two hours each this coming Saturday and Sunday (Mother’s Day) starting at 8 p.m. Eastern on Lifetime. It is a story extremely well told. 

Sometimes, in biographies and documentaries, the word “authorized” is a red flag. “Authorized” sometimes translates to “sanitized” -- a word used to describe authorized life stories in which the subjects edit out the hard stuff of life.

This is certainly not the case with “The Judds: Truth Be Told.” The word “authorized” is not seen anywhere in the show’s publicity materials, and Wynonna Judd, 60, and sister Ashley Judd, 57, are full participants in the show.

They are open and emotional throughout, which indicates that they were OK with telling their family story whether good, bad or ugly.

Their mother, Naomi Judd, is omnipresent too in pictures and audio. Her death by suicide in April 2022 shocked the world. She was 76. Not surprisingly, her daughters are still dealing with the emotional fallout. 

Audio of Naomi talking about her life’s challenges makes up a good deal of the documentary because she used her own voice for the audiobook of her 2017 memoir “River of Time: My Descent Into Depression and How I Emerged With Hope.”

The four-part documentary tells the full story of the Judd family starting with Naomi’s upbringing in Ashland, Kentucky. 

She had a younger brother who died of leukemia, and she had her first child out of wedlock at age 17 while still in high school. The daughter was Wynonna, followed by Ashley four years later.

Wynonna and her mother went on to make history as The Judds (photo above), the most successful mother-daughter duo in the history of country music, and possibly all music.

Ashley went on to become a movie star. More recently, she emerged as one of the women who accused former Miramax movie mogul Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment, but the case was dismissed.

“The Judds: Truth Be Told” was directed by Alexandra Dean, whose documentary credits include “Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story.”

Episode One, titled “A Mother’s Smile,” carries a disclaimer: “The following program contains discussions of suicide, violence and sexual assault. Viewer discretion is advised.”

“The Judd Family: Truth Be Told” airs Saturday, May 10, and Sunday, May 11, at 8 p.m. Eastern on Lifetime.