While investigating the furtive world of illegal doping in sports, director Bryan Fogel connects with renegade Russian scientist Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov—a pillar of his country’s “anti-doping” program. Over dozens of Skype calls, urine samples, and badly administered hormone injections, Fogel and Rodchenkov grow closer despite shocking allegations that place Rodchenkov at the center of Russia’s state-sponsored Olympic doping program.
Icarus is a 2017 American documentary film by Bryan Fogel. It was an initial attempt by Fogel to expose the inadequacy of existing policies and procedures to catch athletes who use banned performance-enhancing substances. But later, the project shifted its focus after pressures related to the World Anti-Doping Agency's investigation of doping in Russia led Grigory Rodchenkov, the head of the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory and one of Fogel's primary advisors, to flee Russia and become a whistleblower.
