Entertainment
Ron Howard: From Apollo 13 to Avedon
In 1994 Ron Howard rebuilt NASA's Apollo 13 crisis for the screen. Now his documentary Avedon, drawn from Richard Avedon's own archive, arrives on Netflix Wednesday, Nov. 11.
In December 1994, Ron Howard stood at NASA's Kennedy Space Center filming his re-creation of one of the space agency's closest calls. This week, the director's documentary *Avedon*, built from photographer Richard Avedon's own archive, arrives on Netflix on Wednesday, Nov. 11.
Then: December 1994, Kennedy Space Center
NASA photographs dated Dec. 13, 1994, show Howard filming scenes at Kennedy Space Center with Tom Hanks for the film that became *Apollo 13*. It opened in 1995, with Hanks as mission commander Jim Lovell.
The story was real. In April 1970, Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise launched for the Moon. Two days out, an oxygen tank exploded and tore open their service module. Working with Mission Control, the crew improvised their way home and splashed down safely in the South Pacific on April 17, 1970.
Howard could not film the real crisis, so he rebuilt it. Spacecraft replicas stood in for the hardware. For weightless scenes, the cast and crew flew aboard NASA's KC-135 reduced-gravity jet, nicknamed the "Vomit Comet." In a 2025 Library of Congress interview, Howard said each dive gave about 23 seconds of weightlessness; Yale's film archive notes the production flew 612 arcs.
The actual command module, *Odyssey*, is displayed at the Cosmosphere in Hutchinson, Kansas. *Apollo 13* earned nine Academy Award nominations and won two, for film editing and sound.
The change
Howard kept chasing true stories, but increasingly told them without actors, in documentaries including *The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years* (2016), *Pavarotti* (2019) and *Jim Henson Idea Man* (2024).
Now: *Avedon*, on Netflix Nov. 11
Howard premiered *Avedon* at the Cannes Film Festival on May 17, 2026. He told Deadline that "for the first time the [Richard Avedon] foundation and the family were willing to give a documentary group access, really full access to these archives." Netflix says the film draws on that "unprecedented access" to Avedon's personal archives, including never-before-seen stills, behind-the-lens footage and new interviews, and that it premieres on Netflix on Nov. 11.
Reviewing the film on Nov. 8, Variety critic Owen Gleiberman called *Avedon* "a fantastic movie" and "the best documentary Ron Howard has made," praising Andrew Morreale's editing. The film runs 105 minutes and is rated R, according to Variety.
Why it matters
In 1994, Howard's challenge was manufacturing history convincingly. With *Avedon*, his challenge was choosing from an overwhelming real record. Same storyteller, different raw material.
Reporting Sources
Photo & Video Credits
Credit: THEN: NASA, Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA). NOW: Vbrunophotog, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped/edited for cover.. License: Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) + CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: file page.
Editorial notes
Sources
- Netflix Tudum, "Ron Howard's Richard Avedon Documentary Will Premiere in November": https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/avedon-release-date-news
- Variety, Owen Gleiberman, "'Avedon' Review" (Nov. 8, 2026): https://variety.com/2026/film/reviews/avedon-review-ron-howard-richard-avedon-1236942472/
- Deadline, Ron Howard interview (May 21, 2026): https://deadline.com/video/ron-howard-interview-richard-avedon-documentary/
- Festival de Cannes, *Avedon*: https://www.festival-cannes.com/f/avedon/
- NASA / Wikimedia Commons caption, KSC-94pc1510 (Dec. 13, 1994): https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_13_filming_at_KSC_(KSC-94pc1510).jpg
- NASA, Apollo 13 mission overview: https://www.nasa.gov/mission/apollo-13/
- Library of Congress, "Behind the Scenes of Apollo 13 with Ron Howard" (Apr. 2025): https://blogs.loc.gov/now-see-hear/2025/04/behind-the-scenes-of-apollo-13-with-ron-howard/
- Yale Film Archive notes, *Apollo 13*: https://web.library.yale.edu/film/notes/fn00029
- Cosmosphere: https://cosmo.org/about/about-the-cosmosphere/
Photo credits
All images are archival photographs used under their stated licenses; no Netflix key art is used. Edits: crop/resize, slow pan/zoom, dark background plate, captions, date labels and NewsCubby branding. Faces are not altered. No endorsement by the people shown, the photographers or NASA is implied. NewsCubby's adaptations of the CC BY-SA photos are offered under the same CC BY-SA license version as the original; originals keep their own licenses.
| Time (s) | Image | Creator / license | Source | |---|---|---|---| | 0.0-7.9, 53.8-58.1 | Ron Howard on location for Apollo 13, Dec. 1994 | NASA — Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) (https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ron_Howard_in_1994.jpg | | 7.9-13.1, 31.6-36.9 | Ron Howard directing Apollo 13 at Kennedy Space Center, Dec. 1994 | NASA — Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) (https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_13_filming_at_KSC_(KSC-94pc1510).jpg | | 13.1-18.3 | The real Apollo 13 crew: Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert, Fred Haise, April 1970 | NASA — Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) (https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Actual_Apollo_13_Prime_Crew_-_GPN-2000-001167.jpg | | 18.3-22.6 | Apollo 13 service module damage, photographed by the crew, April 17, 1970 | NASA Johnson Space Center — Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) (https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:View_of_damaged_Apollo_13_Service_Module_from_the_Lunar-Command_Modules_(as13-59-8500).jpg | | 22.6-28.6 | Apollo 13 splashdown, South Pacific, April 17, 1970 | NASA Johnson Space Center — Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) (https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_13_spacecraft_splashdown_in_the_South_Pacific_Ocean_(s70-35644).jpg | | 28.6-31.6 | Tom Hanks on the Apollo 13 shoot at Kennedy Space Center, Dec. 1994 | NASA — Public domain (PD-USGov, NASA) (https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_13_filming_at_KSC_(KSC-94pc1510).jpg | | 36.9-43.0, 43.0-48.9 | NASA KC-135 N930NA, used for Apollo 13 weightless scenes (2017) | Alan Wilson — CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Boeing_KC-135A_Stratotanker_%E2%80%98N930NA%E2%80%99_(39589896675).jpg | | 48.9-53.8 | The real Apollo 13 capsule, Odyssey, at the Cosmosphere, 2018 | Balon Greyjoy — CC0 1.0 Universal (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:20180502_Apollo_13_command_module_Cosmosphere_1.jpg | | 58.1-63.5 | Ron Howard at the Toronto International Film Festival, 2024 | Jay Dixit / WikiPortraits — CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ron_Howard_at_the_2024_Toronto_International_Film_Festival_05.jpg | | 63.5-69.2 | Ron Howard at the Toronto International Film Festival, 2024 | Jay Dixit — CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ron_Howard_at_the_2024_Toronto_International_Film_Festival_01.jpg | | 69.2-75.4, 82.1-88.4 | Ron Howard at the Avedon premiere, Cannes, May 2026 | Gabriel Hutchinson / WikiPortraits — CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ron_Howard_speaks_at_the_premier_of_%22Avedon%22_01.jpg | | 75.4-82.1 | Ron Howard at Cannes, May 2026 | Vbrunophotog — CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) | https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ron_Howard_interview_at_Elvis_Mitchell_lounge_at_2026_Cannes_Film_Festival_01.jpg |
Cover and thumbnail: THEN, NASA (public domain, PD-USGov), Ron Howard on location for Apollo 13, Dec. 1994; NOW, Vbrunophotog, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped, Ron Howard at Cannes, May 2026.
Narration is AI-generated (OpenAI gpt-4o-mini-tts). No music.
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