★★★★☆
Behind 21st Century Fox’s The Assassination of Gianni Versace is a dark tale of tragedy and psychotic violence.
Andrew Cunanan was a serial killer who, after beating a former US Naval Officer to death with a claw hammer, and stabbing victim Lee Miglin 20 times with a screwdriver, shot Gianni Versace on the doorstep of his Miami beach mansion.
The show first aired on the last day of February on BBC Two, and is the second in the series following on from The People Vs OJ Simpson.
American Crime Story is a hypnotic watch, depicting real life crimes in the airbrushed universe of American TV.
It sounds like an ideal combination, and it almost is, watching superstars including Penelope Cruz as Donatella Versace, on the small screen in sets dripping with expense.
However problems lie within American Crime Story. One of them being that, in approaching stories that are incredibly sensitive to certain people (impending lawsuits and all the rest of it) the show is almost tied having to play it incredibly straightforward in nature.
By the end of OJ it felt like the veneer of drama was starting to fade away. Replaced by a systemic approach to bullet pointing all the facts, safely tying all the loose ends, and then the viewer starts resentfully realising he/she has just spent ten hours of their life watching a ‘did he/didn’t he’ murder mystery in which everyone knows the conclusion.
This shouldn’t deter the viewer. The show still nestles exceptionally the essence of its entertainment- the common person’s fascination with murder. And there’s not so much ‘did he/didn’t he’ in Versace’s murder. We watch Cunanan kill him in the opening scene.
It’s also worth watching for the performances of Darren Criss (Cunanan) and Ricky Martin (Versace’s forsaken lover Antonio D’Amico). Martin is a powerful performer if a little hammy. While Criss plays the disturbed Cunanan with an emotionally naive, child-like demeanour that is inclemently spine chilling.
Tag: april 2018
Careers In Film Summit
Come learn about careers in the motion picture industry from working Academy members and film professionals. Topics will include the pre-production, production, and post-production phases and the various skills used throughout the movie making process. | 14 April 2018
(Source: https://player.vimeo.com/)
Sitcom Reboot – SNL | 14 April 2018
*Andrew Cunanan reference at 2:25
(Source: https://www.youtube.com/)
Damien Love’s TV highlights
American Crime Story: The Assassination Of Gianni Versace
9pm, BBC Two
As this astonishing series nears its end, it gets even more brain scrambling. It’s the penultimate episode, and the backwards-running structure stretches back to its furthest points, to offer two parallel, contrasting portraits of childhood, in two different timeframes. In 1957, we glimpse the young Gianni Versace, aged 10 or so, and encouraged by his dressmaker mother to follow his heart and learn about and designing clothes, despite the taunts of other kids and disapproval of his teachers. Flipping forward to 1980 comes a fuller and more unsettling picture of Andrew Cunanan around the same age – singled out for special treatment and pressurised to succeed by his father, Modesto, a stockbroker with big dreams, and given to making big exaggerations about himself. As Cunanan becomes a young man, however, the house of cards Modesto has built begins to collapse. Darren Criss’s performance as Cunanan is extraordinary again, while the casting of the child actor playing young Cunanan (Edouard Holdener) is spooky.
Watch What Happens Live Comes To LA And Courts Emmy Voters
This isn’t the first time “Watch What Happens Live! with Andy Cohen” has shot in Los Angeles, but there was something different Monday night about the Bravo talk show’s broadcast at the historic Wiltern theater. Oh, right. It was the rows of Television Academy Emmy voting members invited to catch the festivities first hand.
[…] As for the night’s episode, Cohen’s guests were two other Emmy contenders, “This Is Us‘” Milo Ventimiglia and “The Assassination of Gianni Versace’s“ Ricky Martin (who Cohen repeatedly reminded us also has a current Las Vegas residency). Word was having the two potential acting nominees on hand wasn’t planned for an audience partially filled with Television Academy voters, but it didn’t hurt FX’s campaigns that Darren Criss, also from “Versace,” stopped by at the end of the half hour to take shots with Cohen and his guests (Oh, drinking is also a big part of the ‘WWHL’ experience). Viewers learned that Ventimiglia is sort of a bad interview (the large audience might have hurt) and Martin is pretty blunt (he chastised himself for not coming out during a notorious Barbara Walters interview in 2010). The sound also was problematic (the audience often had problems hearing what was being said on stage), but a lesson learned when figuring out where to film the next time around. Other guests this week in LA include the entire cast of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills,” Anna Faris and Snoop Dogg, among others.
16 of the Best Anthology Series Ever on Television
Ryan Murphy is one of the hottest names in TV, and he’s behind a few of the top anthology series. American Crime Story tells a different true crime story each season, and the first two seasons have been unreal. The first season, which focused on the murder trial of OJ Simpson, received universal acclaim and basically won every award. Sarah Paulson was amazing as prosecutor Marcia Clark, and the entire supporting cast was just great. The recent second season told the story of Gianni Versace‘s murder, and it was also pretty strong.
Pop Rocket Episode 162: Pop Rocket is for Lovers with Dave White
Karen Tongson takes over hosting duties this week and film critic Dave White joins the panel to discuss all things Valentine’s Day. Who are our favorite TV couples? Are rom coms over? What couple do our panelists aspire to be like? Plus, Karen talks the Winter Olympics, Dave tells us about his new favorite chef, and Wynter has a few more words on Versace. | 14 February 2018
Darren Criss on Elvis Duran and The Morning Show (April 13th, 2018)
Judith Light for InStyle Magazine | 13 April 2018
Judith Light Opens Up About her Former Struggles with Emotional Eating
[…] LB: Speaking of substance, you are about to start shooting the fifth season of Transparent.
JL: It’s going to be later than planned. I also just finished working with [writer, producer, and director] Ryan Murphy on The Assassination of Gianni Versace …
LB: And people are dying over it, asking to change the Emmy categories so you can get the guest actress nomination. You’ve always received a lot of attention, but how does it feel when you get this confluence of great reviews?
JL: It’s so wild. It always feels good. I was at a Christmas party with Joan Rivers once, and we were having this lovely conversation, and she said, “I say yes to everything,” explaining that the world works out for you in certain ways when you say yes to things. And it’s true. That’s how a whole trajectory of things fell into place, including working with Ryan Murphy, which is something I’ve always wanted to do.
LB: And he’s so great with women who aren’t 12. I mean, Jessica [Lange], Kathy [Bates] …
JL: Exactly. We didn’t really know each other, and then, when he saw a play I did [Other Desert Cities] and the response to it, he just said, “OK, we’ll do things.” He was so incredibly gracious and kind.
LB: Isn’t it wonderful that one of the great things about getting older is the equity you own? There’s something about “You know me and my work, and you know that I’ll show up for you” …
JL: That is so brilliant and so true.
LB: Who do you find beautiful?
JL: The memory of my mother is very beautiful to me. My father, the same thing: really light, beautiful. We’re talking about soul beauty now. My husband has been so beautiful and present for me—you know, my publicist, my agents, my friends … All the people I worked with on The Assassination of Gianni Versace and Transparent. They are people who are there in the goodness of their being, not in their doing.
LB: And that is …
JL: That is beauty.
Judith Light Opens Up About her Former Struggles with Emotional Eating
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