The American producer, screenwriter and actor Morgan Spurlock, nominated for an Oscar for the documentary Super Size Me, in which he showed the health effects of McDonald’s food consumed daily and exclusively for a month, died this Thursday in New York at the age of 53 as a result of cancer, according to family sources reported by various media in his country.
“Morgan gave so much through his art, ideas and generosity. The world has lost a true creative genius and a special man. “I am very proud to have worked alongside him,” said his brother, Craig Spurlock, who worked with him on several projects.
After a decade in the world of playwriting and experimenting with different formats and new languages through social networks, Spurlock rose to fame in 2004 with his innovative Super Size Me, an experiment starring himself to evaluate the effects of the diet followed by part of the North American population.
Over the course of a month, Spurlock ate at several McDonald’s restaurants three times a day, consuming an average of 5,000 calories a day. Before the report, she ate a varied diet, was 1.88 m tall and weighed 84.1 kg. After 30 days, she gained more than 11 kilos and her body mass index increased by 13%. As the documentary shows, he also experienced mood swings, sexual dysfunction and was diagnosed with fatty liver. The work was nominated for an Academy Award in the category of Best Feature Documentary.
Super Size Me had its second part IN 2019: Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken!, which in this case offered a stark vision of a model of industrial production of foods of animal origin that processes 9 billion animals a year in the United States. .
Spurlock also directed Where is Osama Bin Laden? (2008), where he addresses the fight against terrorism; The Simpsons 20th Anniversary Special: in 3-D! On ice! (2010); Freakonomics (2010), an adaptation of the book of the same name by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner; Committed: The Toronto International Film Festival (2010), and The Best Movie Ever Sold (2011), a documentary about product placement, marketing and advertising, among other projects.
Additionally, Spurlock hosted and produced the series 30 Days, which aired from 2005 to 2008; Morgan Spurlock Inside Man (2013-2016), and Consider the Source (2015), in association with Disney’s Maker Studios. In 2017, a sexual assault that he allegedly carried out during his university days came to light, which he himself defined as “inappropriate sexual conduct.”