Source: Prince Williams / Getty
If you were outside in the 90’s, you no doubt attended or heard about Freaknik, the proudly Black spring break event that would go down in Atlanta. On Thursday, April 6, Hulu announced it’s releasing Freaknik: The Wildest Party Never Told, a documentary about the famed, or infamous, annual gathering of Black college students and partiers.
Variety reports that Hulu describes the doc as recounting “the rise and fall of a small Atlanta HBCU picnic that exploded into an influential street party and spotlighted ATL as a major cultural stage.
The legend goes that Freaknik, originally Freaknic, started as a gathering in an Atlanta park in the ’80’s. The Georgia city is the home to the HBCU’s of the Atlanta University Center (AUC) that include Morehouse, Spelman, Clark-Atlanta and Morris Brown. Soon enough, word got out of the annual event which quickly grew bigger and bigger, eventually becoming a whole weekend of festivities in April.
Add the burgeoning Atlanta Hip-Hop scene that included the Dungeon Family (OutKast, Goodie Mob) and So So Def Records and the legend only grew and perhaps got too big. The city of Atlanta essentially put the kibosh on Freaknic in 1999, citing safety concerns with politicians going so far as saying they would sue anyone organizing Freaknic events.
Speaking of So So Def, the label’s founder Jermaine Dupri is serving as one of the doc’s executive producers. The documentary seems to be in good hands with director P. Frank Williams and Luther Campbell also serving as executive producers, amongst others.
