A star-studded group of Black women are chronicling their hair journeys in an upcoming docuseries called "The Hair Tales," the Oprah Winfrey Network and Disney's Onyx Collective jointly announced Sept. 28 with a trailer release.
TODAY got an exclusive first look at the trailer for the six-part series starring Tracee Ellis Ross, Oprah Winfrey, Issa Rae, Chloe Bailey, Marsai Martin, Michaela Angela Davis, rapper Chika, congresswoman Ayanna Pressley and more. The docuseries premieres Oct. 22 on Hulu and OWN in the United States, on Star+ in Latin America and on Disney+ in all other territories. Each episode features stories of how hair has impacted each guest’s identity, creativity and how they are perceived.
Ross is also the host and an executive producer and she said in the trailer to fellow executive producer Winfrey, "it can feel like it's just a conversation about hair, but it's not."
"It never is," Winfrey responded, later adding, "I learned early on that straighter was better."
In the trailer, Rae described how, "to know the hair growing out of my head was not socially acceptable was devastating," a sentiment the other guests said they had experienced. The trailer ends with them sharing why they now celebrate their hair.
The docuseries comes after Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars over a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith's bald head due to alopecia. The slap resurfaced Rock's controversial documentary "Good Hair." The documentary questioned what is considered good hair in the Black community. "The Hair Tales," on the other hand, is more interested in how Black women's hair is analogous to their energy and how they move through the world, according to the trailer.
Ross says in the trailer, "'The Hair Tales' is using hair as a metaphor for us to be with the humanity of us as Black women."
