Melissa Etheridge Says She Wants to ‘Lift People Up’ in Trailer for New Prison Concert Docuseries
‘Melissa Etheridge: I’m Not Broken’ is streaming in two parts on Paramount+ on July 9
Melissa Etheridge is making a grand homecoming.
The Grammy-winning star, 63, recently returned to her hometown of Leavenworth, Kansas for an inspiring performance at the local women’s prison — and she’s now ready to share it with the world.
The trailer for Melissa Etheridge: I’m Not Broken was released on Monday, June 10, giving viewers a glimpse at the upcoming two-part Paramount+ docuseries that sees Etheridge putting on a rocking show for women at the Topeka Correctional Facility.
“The best I can do is to be a light that holds these people up and says, ‘You matter,’” the star says in the trailer.
I’m Not Broken features the stories of five different women currently behind bars at Topeka Correctional Facility, all of whom shared a written correspondence with Etheridge prior to her visit.
The trailer says that of the 172,000 women imprisoned in the U.S., about half are recovering from substance abuse, a cause that hits close to home for the singer.
“A lot of women in this prison, they keep making the same mistakes. I lost my son to an opioid overdose. It is an epidemic,” Etheridge says in the trailer. “I mean, I know your experiences. My whole intention with the concert is to lift people up. I’ve been working on this for weeks and weeks, so know that when you hear this song tomorrow that you all are in that song.”
Etheridge lost her son Beckett, 21, to an opioid overdose in May 2020. She has since been public about her grief, and in 2023, wrote the book Talking to My Angels, which focused heavily on Beckett’s addiction struggles and her grief journey.
Her new docuseries “tells an inspiring story of healing and transcendence through the power of music when five female residents from the Topeka Correctional Facility, a women’s prison in Kansas, write letters to Etheridge that she uses as inspiration to create and perform an original song for them,” a press release says.
“Melissa Etheridge works to understand and interrupt the cycle of addiction while connecting with these women who, so often, are forgotten by society,” the release continues.
