New HBO doc “The Janes” offers a preview of a post-Roe future by looking to the past

There was no such thing as a “legal abortion” in the era before Roe v. Wade, but that didn’t mean that abortions weren’t being performed. “The mob was providing abortions in the city of Chicago,” Tia Lessin offers up as a reminder. “It was lucrative. They could charge thousands and thousands of dollars.” Lessin and Emma Pildes directed the upcoming HBO documentary “The Janes” about The Jane Collective, a group of young women in 1960s Chicago who developed a covert network in the city to help women access safe, affordable, and discreet abortions. “They’re sophisticated women, very savvy,” Pildes tells Ali Velshi. As Roe v. Wade appears to be on the brink of being overturned by an ultra-conservative Supreme Court, “The Janes” is a reminder of the inequities that existed in the absence of women’s reproductive rights.June 4, 2022