The act was created in 1988 by Frank Farian, founder of Boney M.,[2] and consisted of Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus as the lip-syncing performers,[3] with the two actual main studio singers, Brad Howell and John Davis,[4] and studio singers Charles Shaw, Jodie Rocco,[5] and Linda Rocco,[5][6] with an unrelated touring band.

Their debut album, as All or Nothing in Europe, and expanded, including "Baby Don't Forget My Number" and "Blame It on the Rain", composed by Diane Warren,[7] as Girl You Know It's True in the United States, achieved international success and brought them a Grammy Award for Best New Artist on 21 February 1990.

[18] The German music producer Frank Farian, who had previously created the disco group Boney M., invited Pilatus and Morvan to his Frankfurt studio to listen to a demo, "Girl You Know It's True".

[19] The final mix of "Girl You Know It's True" was finished by studio performers—including Charles Shaw, John Davis, Brad Howell, and twin sisters Jodie and Linda Rocco[20]—in March and April.

[21] By May, Pilatus and Morvan were touring Spain, France and Italy, lip-syncing to the pre-recorded tracks and thrilling crowds with their distinct style — spandex shorts, thigh-high boots and cornrow hair extensions.

It was a major success, producing five singles, including the title track of the American version, that all entered the Top 5 of the Billboard Hot 100.

[28][29][30][31][32] The first public sign that the group was lip-syncing came on 21 July 1989, during a live performance on MTV at the Lake Compounce theme park in Bristol, Connecticut.

[34] In a March 1990 issue of Time magazine, Pilatus was quoted proclaiming himself to be "the new Elvis", reasoning that by the duo's success they were more talented musically than Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger.

This prompted singer Charles Shaw to reveal in December 1989 that he was one of the three actual vocalists on the album and that Pilatus and Morvan were impostors.

The next day, Pilatus and Morvan gave a press conference in front of more than 100 journalists in Los Angeles where they stated their willingness to return their Grammy Award.

The duo said they had "made a deal with the devil", and they sang and rapped for the room in order to prove that, although they had not sung on their records, they could, in fact, sing.

[16] After these details emerged, lawsuits were filed under various U.S. consumer fraud protection laws against Arista Records, Pilatus and Morvan.

[46] Adding to the controversy, in December 1990, singer-songwriter David Clayton-Thomas sued Milli Vanilli for copyright infringement, alleging that the title song of All or Nothing used the melody from his 1968 composition "Spinning Wheel", a hit for his group Blood, Sweat & Tears.

The film, without describing them as innocent, points out that a great many people knew about the deception, but the singers became the scapegoats; the popular narrative was incomplete and misdirected at the two public faces of a much larger operation.

"[48][49] Subsequent to the revelation exposing the non-authentic vocal contributions of Morvan and Pilatus to the Milli Vanilli project, Frank Farian undertook a reconfiguration of the originally planned album for the initial duo.

For the American market, Farian chose to avoid any association with Milli Vanilli and had the tracks re-recorded with Ray Horton on the majority of lead vocals.

Seven of the songs from The Moment of Truth were reworked and released as an eponymous album, with the addition of Tracy Ganser and Kevin Weatherspoon on vocals.

[52] The album contained three additional songs: "Ding Dong", "Who Do You Love", and a cover version of Dr. Hook's "Sexy Eyes".

They also portrayed animated versions of themselves in an episode of The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3 and even signed with a PR firm in hopes of breaking into acting.

"[55] Morvan and Pilatus moved to Los Angeles and signed with the Joss Entertainment Group; Sandy Gallin was their manager.

[57] Due to financial constraints, Joss Entertainment Group was able to release the album only in the United States, the priority market to Milli Vanilli.

However, the lack of publicity, poor distribution, and their steep fall from the height of pop-culture visibility after the lip-syncing scandal contributed to its failure.

[60] On the eve of the new album's promotional tour on 3 April 1998, Pilatus was found dead of a suspected alcohol and prescription drug overdose in a hotel room in Frankfurt, Germany.

[65] In 2015 TMZ reported that Morvan was working on an album with John Davis, one of the original Milli Vanilli singers, called Face Meets Voice.

[70] The documentary Milli Vanilli: From Fame to Shame, directed by German Oliver Schwehm and produced by Hannah Lenitzki from Bremedia Produktion, was released in 2016.

[78] On his Facebook fanpage, Fab Morvan announced on 4 July 2022 the new documentary film about Milli Vanilli in the works, which he was involved in.

The website's consensus reads: "With clarity and compassion, Milli Vanilli reframes one of pop's most infamous scandals as a sobering cautionary tale.

[86] Between 2021 and 2022, Simon Verhoeven directed and wrote the Milli-Vanilli biopic Girl You Know It's True, which was filmed in Munich, Berlin, Cape Town, and Los Angeles.

[87] The movie stars Tijan Njie and Elan Ben Ali as Pilatus and Morvan as well as Matthias Schweighöfer as Farian.

In June 2024, Vertical acquired North American distribution rights to the film, planning a day-and-date release on August 9, 2024.