Eight years after “19 Kids and Counting” went off the air, a new docuseries is pulling back the curtain on the Duggar family, their conservative religious faith and the controversies that brought about their fall from grace.
On Friday, Amazon Prime Video gave viewers a glimpse of “Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets” via a new trailer. Premiering June 2, the four-episode series “seeks to expose the truth beneath the wholesome Americana surface of reality TV’s favorite mega-family,” according to press notes.
“While details of the family and their scandals unfold,” the synopsis continues, “we realize they’re part of an insidious, much-larger threat already in motion, with democracy itself in peril.”
Several Duggar family members, including Jill Duggar Dillard, appear to have participated in the series.
“There’s a story that’s going to be told, and I would rather be the one telling it,” she explains in the trailer.
Catch the “Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets” trailer below.
The Duggars ― consisting of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar and their 19 children ― rose to fame in 2008 as the stars of the TLC reality series, “19 Kids and Counting.”
The Arkansas family were members of an ultra-conservative religious group, the Institute in Basic Life Principles, and adhered to strict rules that included dressing modestly and homeschooling their children.
In 2015, the show was canceled after Josh Duggar, the eldest of the Duggar children, was accused of molesting his sisters, Jill and Jessa, along with three other girls, while he was a teenager. He later acknowledged having “acted inexcusably,” apologizing for what he described as “my wrongdoing.”
A spinoff series, “Counting On,” premiered in 2015 without Josh’s involvement. However, that show was canceled in 2021 after Josh was found guilty of receiving and possessing child pornography. He’s currently serving a 12-year prison sentence.
