‘Monsters’ Co-Creator Explains Why Time Is Right to Revisit Menendez Brothers Case: ‘Finally Have a Vernacular’ to ‘Discuss Sex Abuse and Mental Health’

Ryan Murphy first started noodling on a TV show about the Menendez brothers in the wake of the success of Netflix’s “Dahmer,” which he co-created alongside his longtime collaborator Ian Brennan.

“One of the things that you and I didn’t know, but soon found out, is that there are literally thousands and thousands and thousands of TikToks from young people, specifically young women, talking about the Lyle and Erik Menendez case,” Murphy noted onstage to Brennan at an NYC premiere screening September 12 of the latest installment of their Netflix true crime anthology, “Monster,” this time “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.”

“I was blown away,” by the social media response, Brennan confirmed, “because it seemed so current to them. I think one of the one of the things is we finally have a vernacular to think about and discuss sex abuse and mental health that did not exist at the time. I was a kid when the case happened, and we didn’t have cable, so I wasn’t watching it on Court TV. I knew the case from ‘Saturday Night Live,’ which the sketch is that they cried on the stand. That was the level of people wrapping their head around this: ‘Oh, look at those guys. Look at those men crying on the stand.’ Not really a thought to why they might be crying. It was just not a sophisticated way of looking at trauma, which I think we just understand better now. And I think that feels really electric and live for a certain age group, who look back at their parents’ generation like, ‘What? What were you doing? You don’t know how to see the world.'”

“Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story” stars Javier Bardem and Chloë Sevigny as the brothers’ parents José and Kitty, alongside relative newcomers Nicholas Alexander Chavez (Lyle) and Cooper Koch (Erik) as the infamous sibling duo. During the Murphy-led cast panel discussion following a screening of Episode 1, it was noted the show would be a Rashomon-esque study in perspectives, given that the only people who know the full truth of the abuse in the Menendez family and the 1989 killings are either dead or in prison.

“When you make a show like our first season ‘Dahmer,’ which was so unexpectedly successful, the thing that was our way in … was really about looking at who gets justice and different forms of social injustice,” Murphy said. “And I felt the same way about this season. This season was about abuse. Who is believed, who’s not believed. … All the stuff in here, by the way, is true. We spent many, many, many years researching this. Things you really can’t make up, but the thing that I was struck by when Ian and I were working on it was … [the show is] really more interested in talking about how monsters are made, as opposed to born. Every season has that in common. This one certainly does, and we try to not have too much judgment about that, because we’re trying to understand why they did something, as opposed to the act of doing something.”

Javier Bardem speaks onstage during the ‘Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story’ panelGetty Images for Netflix

For Bardem, it marks his first series regular TV role, one he wasn’t sure he wanted to take on given the intense subject matter. Bardem explained to assembled guests including Katie Couric, Victor Garber, Lena Waithe, and Peter Sarsgaard that he had originally met Ryan Murphy while working on “Eat, Pray, Love” in Bali. “I was coming out of a very tough moment in my life, and that movie brought me back to the joy of performing,” he said.

“When you play a character like this, I was scared. I’m a father myself. I have huge respect and fear about what the word ‘abuse’ means and can do to people,” Bardem said. “[Also] it’s the first TV show in my life. I’m not used to say[ing] yes without reading something. And I guess that’s how it works [in TV]! … But when the material came, it was obvious that it was something that I would like to be part of because of the conversation [it] will bring to the table about the wounds of abuse through generations.

“One child being abused physically, emotionally, mentally, sexually, is going to have a consequence through years and years to come in different generations,” Bardem continued. “That’s how deep and hard it is, and I relate to that; I want to talk about that. … It’s about us when we come to a failure as human beings. We are so scared of dealing with our inner child that has been so wounded, and we don’t know how to deal with that anger and that fear, and we create the same fear, we create the same pain, on and on and on. I saw many things there that [made me think] I want to be part of that.”

“Dahmer” was a massive smash for the streamer when it debuted in September 2022, and it seems an all-too-safe bet that the follow-up — full of powerful performances, intense subject matter, and WTF-worthy details that will send viewers down a wiki rabbit hole — will be much the same, generating plenty of zeitgeist-dominating talk.

Murphy marked it as much when introducing Chavez and Koch: “It’s September 12, otherwise known as the last [Thursday] before Nicholas and Cooper are super-famous.”

“Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story” will start streaming on Netflix on Thursday, September 19.