Tyler Perry will executive produce the first two episodes of a new Paramount+ documentary series about family members who go missing and those who struggle in the aftermath of their various disappearances.
Each episode of “Never Seen Again” starts with a loved one recounting the last time they saw their son, daughter, brother, sister, boyfriend or girlfriend before they vanished into thin air. The series comes from See It Now Studios, the new production shingle overseen by veteran CBS News producer and former CBS News President Susan Zirinsky. To generate awareness of the program, Paramount+ will make the first episode available for free Saturday, May 7 through Monday, May 10 on the CBS News app, and the first season will be available to stream Tuesday, May 10 on Paramount+.
In the first episode, Aa27-year-old Black man named Terrance Williams disappears in Naples, FL in 2004 after he last being seen getting into a Collier County sheriff’s patrol car. The show considers other circumstances and askes whether the officer, who had been involved in a similar incident, did something illegal.
“I was shocked and outraged,” Perry said in a statement. “I had to get involved. I immediately thought, ‘What can I do to help? What can I do to bring attention to this?” Viewers are encouraged to join the search, to help the families find closure by contacting police departments and Crime Stoppers.
“Never Seen Again” is produced by Efran Films Canada for See It Now Studios. Solly Granatstein is executive producer, along with Tyler Perry as executive producer for the premiere episodes: “Driven Away” and “In the Arms of the Law.” For Efran Films Canada, Solly Granatstein is executive producer and showrunner, and executive producers are Shawn Efran, Azadeh de Leon and Jordan J. Mallari. For See It Now Studios, Susan Zirinsky and Terence Wrong are the executive producers, Aysu Saliba is the supervising producer and Adam Goldfried is the executive director.
Zirinsky launched See It Now with the intention of developing documentary programing for a range of outlets, not just those owned by Paramount Global, the parent company behind the Paramount+ streamer. In an era when more people are streaming video choices as they see fit, she sees a growing market for this sort of programming. “I’m not a sliver of the network, or producing just for the inside,” she told Variety in an interview in January. “My mandate is to be a studio.”