‘Documentary was a hoax’

The deception was part of a ‘‘guerrilla marketing campaign’’ that went too far, network president Bonnie Hammer said on Friday.

Sci Fi claimed last month that Shyamalan had stopped participating with the channel’s documentary about his life when the questions got too personal. Documentarians Nathaniel Kahn and Callum Greene pressed on and made a three-hour film — The Buried Secret of M. Night Shyamalan — without his cooperation, the network said.

The Associated Press wrote about the documentary last month, prompting other media to run accounts that also stressed the supposed conflict. In a news release last month, Sci Fi said Shyamalan had tried to shut down production of the ‘‘disturbing expose.’’

It was all a lie and there is no buried secret, Hammer said on Friday. She couldn’t be reached for further comment. ‘‘We created a fictional special that was part fact, part fiction and Night was part of the creation from the beginning,’’ she said. Shyamalan couldn’t be reached for comment. —(LAT-WP)