What time will The Janes air on HBO? Release date, plot and more details explored

HBO's upcoming documentary The Janes set to premiere on June 8, 2022 (Image via @HBODocs/Twitter)
HBO's upcoming documentary The Janes set to premiere on June 8, 2022 (Image via @HBODocs/Twitter)

HBO is bringing its documentary The Janes to the small screen, paying homage to the abortion rights protests waging across nations, and following abortion activists from a historical perspective.

Helmed by the Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker Tia Lessin along with producer Emma Pildes, who created the Emmy-nominated Jane Fonda in Five Acts, the documentary is expected to premiere at this year's Sundance Film Festival via HBO Documentary Films. It is all set to broadcast on June 8, 2022, and will make its way through HBO at 9 pm ET before being outstretched to HBO Max.

Debuting at a time when the debate over abortion rights has resurfaced and intensified in the US, The Janes will have far-reaching implications throughout the country, turning the already heated movement into something historic and of great significance.

Learn more about the documentary that will narrate the story of a group of abortion activists from 1970s and take viewers on a journey to the American era before Roe v. Wade when abortion was not governed by federal law.


HBO's The Janes: Release date, time, and other details

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Premiering this June 8, at 9 pm ET, the HBO documentary film The Janes is based on the real-life stories of a remarkable, underground collective of activists in 1970s Chicago before Roe v. Wade existed, who put their lives and careers at stake to assist women seeking efficient and reliable abortions before the right to do so was established.

Featuring first-hand accounts and front-row experience from women who actively participated in the initiative, which functioned right under the noses of the Illinois state legislature that effectively banned abortions, the Catholic Church that vilified it, and the Chicago mob that prospered from it, all in the name of providing women with better and cost-effective accessibility to the medical protocol.

During a time when simply distributing information about abortion was illegal, they risked their lives to aid women and helped over 11,000 get inexpensive or free abortions. The upcoming HBO original documentary aims to tell the hitherto untold narrative of this group of women who risked it all.

The official synopsis of the documentary states:

"In the spring of 1972, police raided an apartment on the South Side of Chicago where seven women who were part of a clandestine network were arrested. Using code names, fronts and safe houses to protect themselves and their work, the accused had built an underground network for women seeking safe, affordable and illegal abortions. They called themselves 'Jane.' In the pre-Roe v Wade era — a time when abortion was a crime in most states and even circulating information about abortion was a felony in Illinois — the Janes provided low-cost and free abortions to an estimated 11,000 women."

The Janes will have several American activists such as Heather Booth, Judith Arcana, Marie Leaner, Diane Stevens, and Eleanor Oliver, among others recounting their roles in "Jane," making it the first time for a few of them to have spoken about it publicly.

Furthermore, the documentary will also include interviews with women who were assisted by the Janes during the 70's, along with attorneys, physicians, and other specialists who will discuss the time period.


Watch the historic HBO documentary narrating the illuminating and consequential tale of these Chicago women activists on June 8, 2022.

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Edited by Somava