Ryan Murphy, the creator of “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” defends the new Netflix series after one of the brothers sharply criticized it.
In a statement released by his wife on Netflix on Thursday, Erik Menendez criticized the series, which was released on Netflix on Thursday, as “blatant lies” and called the portrayal of his brother Lyle “ruinous.”
The series tells the story of the 1989 shotgun murders of Jose and Kitty Menendez in their Beverly Hills, California, home and the trials of their sons. Joseph “Lyle” Menendez, now 56, and Erik Menendez, now 53, were convicted of the murder of their parents in 1996 after two trials and sentenced to life in prison without parole. They remain incarcerated in a California prison.
Ryan Murphy responded to Erik Menendez’s backlash on Monday, telling E! News, “I know he hasn’t seen the show, so I find that odd.”
“I know that for a fact. I hope he watches it. I think if he watches it, he would be incredibly proud of Cooper Koch, who plays him,” Murphy said. The series is the second season of his “Monsters” series, following the last season about serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer.
“I think the show is very interesting – we try to show many, many, many, many perspectives,” Murphy said. “Each episode presents a new theory based on the people who were either involved in the case or covered it.”
Murphy said that since the series is based on a true crime, “we know how it ended.”
“We know that two people were brutally shot. Our position and our goal was to present you with all the facts and get you to do two things: make up your own minds about who is innocent, who is guilty and who is the monster, and also have a conversation about something that is never talked about in our culture, which is sexual abuse of men, and we do that responsibly.”
The brothers had stated in their first trials that they had been sexually abused by their father for years and that they had killed their parents out of fear and trauma. The prosecution argued that they had killed their parents in order to inherit their fortune. The abuse allegations were deemed inadmissible in their second joint trial in court.
“When you watch this show, 60 to 65 percent of it is Erik and Lyle Menendez talking about their abuse, about how they were victims, about what they went through emotionally,” Murphy said. “These two guys on our show get their moment in court and then some.”
Murphy said he is no stranger to controversy surrounding his work.
“I’m used to it. I write about provocative and controversial things and my motto is, ‘Never complain and never explain,'” he told E! News.
In his statement Thursday, Erik Menendez said, “I thought we had moved beyond the lies and devastating character portrayals of Lyle, creating a caricature of Lyle based on horrific and obvious lies that were rampant on the show. I can only believe this was done on purpose. It is with a heavy heart that I must say that I believe Ryan Murphy cannot be so naive and inaccurate about the facts of our lives to do this without malicious intent.”
“It saddens me to know that Netflix’s dishonest portrayal of the tragedies surrounding our crime pushes painful truths back several steps – back to an era when prosecutors built their narrative on a belief system that said men were not sexually assaulted and that men experienced rape trauma differently than women,” he continued.
