Netflix Acquires Wu-Tang Clan Documentary 'The Disciple: A Wu-Tang Fable', Sets October Release
Netflix has acquired the documentary The Disciple: A Wu-Tang Fable and set it for an October 16 release on the streaming service, according to Variety.
The film, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, tells the story of Dutch-Moroccan rapper and producer Tarik Azzougarh, known by his stage name Cilvaringz. It charts his creation of Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, a 31-track Wu-Tang Clan record of which only a single copy was pressed. The album took five to six years to make and features artists beyond the Wu-Tang Clan's own roster, per Sundance.
That one copy was auctioned to the highest bidder in 2015. The buyer paid $2 million, making it the most expensive musical work ever sold. The purchaser was Martin Shkreli, a pharmaceutical entrepreneur later convicted of securities fraud.
Wu-Tang Clan founding member the RZA serves as an executive producer and contributor on the documentary, which also features Wu-Tang associate Moongod Allah on screen, per RogerEbert.com's Sundance coverage.
The director is Joanna Natasegara, the Oscar-winning British filmmaker making her feature directorial debut. Natasegara's short film The White Helmets won Netflix its first Academy Award in 2016, establishing a relationship between the filmmaker and the streamer that now extends to a feature-length project.
The production credits span several companies. The Disciple is a Netflix Documentary in association with Studio Gebbia, Film4, 36 Cinema and Sony Music Vision, and an Aluna Entertainment and Violet Films production. Producers include Abigail Anketell-Jones, Lauren Dark and Vanessa Kirby. Executive producers include the RZA, Joe Gebbia, Jason Ropell and Abazar Khayami. Chloë Lambourne and Chris Dickens edited the film.
For a film about a hip-hop artefact that was deliberately kept from public ears, the journey to a global streaming audience carries its own irony. The album at the centre of the story was designed to exist as a single physical object, heard only by its owner. The documentary built around its creation will reach millions of screens on the same October day.
Netflix will release The Disciple: A Wu-Tang Fable on 16 October 2026.
