Taylor Swift breaks down over Southport attack in new documentary
Pop star was emotional as she spoke ahead of meeting families and survivors of the 2024 attack, before going onstage to perform
Taylor Swift broke down in tears ahead of meeting some of the survivors and families of the victims of the Southport stabbing attack, hours before she went onstage to perform a three-hour pop show.
Backstage footage from her Eras tour showed the US pop star, 35, open up about the emotional burden caused by events taking place during her mammoth world tour.
“We’ve had a series of very violent, scary things happen to the tour,” she explains.
Three young girls were killed in the attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance workshop in July 2024, while other children and adults were seriously injured.
“There was this horrible attack in Liverpool at this Taylor Swift-themed dance party,” Swift says in her new six-part documentary series The End of an Era for Disney+, the first two episodes of which were released on Friday (12 December). “And it was little kids that…” She breaks off, whispering in tears: “I have a hard time explaining it.”
She continues: “I’m gonna meet some of these families tonight and… put on a pop concert, you know?”
Wiping away tears, she says: “It’s gonna be fine, because I’m not gonna do this [cry]. I’m gonna be smiling, so any of this gets out of the way before you go onstage and lock it off. Three-and-a-half hours, they don’t have to worry about you.”
Later in the episode, it is explained that Swift met privately with the survivors and families of the Southport attack before each of the five Wembley shows.
Footage shows her and her mother and manager, Andrea Swift, leaving a room after meeting them and walking back to her dressing room in floods of tears.
“I know you helped them,” her mother tells her. “I know it doesn’t seem like it but I know you helped them.”
Adding to the pressure at the same time was the fact that the Wembley show marked Swift’s return to the stage after she was forced to cancel three concerts in Vienna, Austria, due to a terrorist threat.
Swift compared it to being a “pilot flying a plane” and needing to maintain a calm and collected manner no matter how difficult the situation.
“From a mental standpoint, I just do live in a reality that’s very unreal, a lot of the time," Swift says in a voiceover. “But it’s my job to kind of be able to handle all of these feelings and then perk up immediately and perform.
“That’s just the way it’s got to be.”
The first two episodes of Swift’s documentary The End of an Era are on Disney+ now.