‘Miss Americana’ Director Has a 40-Minute Version of Taylor Swift Writing ‘Only the Young’

Taylor Swift fans learned a lot from Miss Americana. The new Netflix documentary covers everything from the pop star’s rise to fame, her struggles with an eating disorder, to her evolution as an increasingly vocal political activist.

On top of all that, director Lana Wilson also spent extensive time with Swift in the music studio, something Swift had rarely allowed journalists, photographers, or filmmakers to do before. Wilson captured hours of behind-the-scenes footage of Swift’s songwriting process that fans would surely love to get their eyeballs on, but, unfortunately—as Wilson told Decider in a phone conversation on Friday—there just wasn’t time to include everything.

“Every film I’ve made is 86 minutes,” said Wilson, who also directed the Emmy-winning 2013 documentary, After Tiller. “I think that’s an ideal length for a movie. I wanted it to feel riveting and gripping. I wasn’t interested in making an encyclopedia entry about Taylor’s career. I wanted to make something that was focused on this specific metamorphosis she was going through.”

That said, she was reticent to cut the footage capturing Swift’s creative process, including a 40-minute version of the musician writing her newest single, “Only the Young,” which was released in conjunction with the film.

“We had a 40-minute version of Taylor writing ‘Only the Young,’ which I found completely riveting,” Wilson said. “There is so much song-writing stuff I wish we could have put in. I could watch that stuff forever.  But I would say all the big moments that I wanted to happen in the film are there.”

When asked if she would ever release that 40-minute behind-the-scenes of “Only the Young” as a deleted scene, Wilson responded, “I don’t know! Maybe! Never say never.”

What do you say, Swifties? If Martin Scorsese gets three-and-half hours for old guys with guns, then Lana Wilson should get at last half as much time for one of the biggest pop stars in the world, right?

Watch Miss Americana on Netflix