Mo Gilligan lived on a diet of fried chicken for four weeks for his first documentary for Netflix.

For his first non-comedic venture for the streaming service – now revealed to be titled Big Chicken: A Fast Food Conspiracy – the stand-up examines the global mass consumption of chicken.

And as part of the project, he ate fried chicken three times a day for 28 days straight to see what it did to his body.

In doing so, he follows in the footsteps of  Morgan Spurlock, who ate at McDonald's three times a day for his award-winning 2004 documentary Super Size Me. The late American film-maker followed that up with his own examination of the chicken industry in 2017.

Chortle first reported on Gilligan’s project in April, but now Netflix has announced that the   96-minute film will be available from 8am on August 5.

In it, the fried-chicken-loving comedian travels from South London to the US  to look into the history of the dish and the industry behind it, from fast-food chains to large-scale farming. It also examines the effect of mass consumption on health and the environment.

Gilligan also uses the film to look at the stereotypes attached to fried chicken and its association with the black community –  and how the dish has been marketed and, at times, appropriated.

In a 2021 interview, the stand-up said: ‘I’ve always been surrounded by chicken: jerk chicken, curry chicken, brown stew chicken … what you can do with chicken is so amazing. I tried to be pescatarian, but after six months, I just had to have a massive piece of jerk chicken. 

‘How other cultures use this meat fascinates me. If you think you’ve had everything with chicken, someone will show you something you’ve never had before.’

The documentary is directed by Liana Stewart, with Aloke Devichand and Nancy Strang as executive producers. Ellie Sabine-Singh is producer for Mindhouse, the company behind Louis Theroux: Inside the Manosphere.

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