The first ‘American Crime Story’ series centred on OJ Simpson – now, Gianni Versace’s murder is on the agenda. Jane Mulkerrins reports
In the summer of 1997, Gianni Versace was at the top of his game. The company he had built from scratch from one boutique in Milan in 1978 was valued at $807 million, and had 130 stores across the world. In under 20 years, this son of a Calabrian dressmaker had transformed the industry with his brazenly sexy, luxury fashion and couture, breaking down the traditional barriers between conservative high fashion and popular culture.
The front rows of his fashion shows were filled with all of his A-list friends, including Diana, Princess of Wales, Elton John and Michael Jackson, while on the runway supermodels such as Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista and Christy Turlington walked for him.
But on the morning of July 15, Versace was shot dead on the steps of his mansion on Miami’s South Beach by Andrew Cunanan, who it later transpired had also murdered four other men, at least two of them gay. Cunanan, a notorious liar, was also gay but initially struggled to come to terms with it, and unable to find a job after dropping out of college, had taken to befriending rich gay men to fund a wealthy lifestyle he was unable to afford.
“It was a political murder,” believes Ryan Murphy, who is recreating the story in the second instalment of his American Crime Story series, The Assassination of Gianni Versace. “[Cunanan] was a person who targeted people specifically to shame them. He wanted to out them and to have a form of payback for a life that he felt he could not live.”
The Assassination of Gianni Versace follows the extraordinary success of Murphy’s first American Crime Story series, The People vs OJ Simpson, an account of the trial of the former NFL superstar for the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. It won nine Emmys and two Golden Globes for its unflinching confrontation with the police corruption, racism and Nineties celebrity culture that helped lead to OJ’s acquittal.
The second instalment – based on the book Vulgar Favors: Andrew Cunanan, Gianni Versace, and the Largest Failed Manhunt in US History, by former Vanity Fair writer Maureen Orth – has been adapted by the British screenwriter Tom Rob Smith, who has flipped the story to tell it backwards, starting with Versace’s murder, in order to understand how Cunanan could have evaded arrest for so long.
“The idea behind American Crime Story was that every season should be not just about a specific crime, but about a crime that America is guilty of, something that implicates us culturally,” says executive producer Nina Jacobson. With the OJ trial, the “cultural crime” was the racism of the LAPD, who were accused of attempting to racially incriminate Simpson. With Versace’s murder, Murphy and his team believe the crime is homophobia, including within the police who were criticised for not prioritising an investigation into Cunanan’s previous victims.
“It’s about the degree of shame and secrecy among gay people in America in the Nineties, in the wake of the Aids epidemic and the difficulty of living an authentic life,” says Jacobson. “It is very easy to think that the way it is now is the way it always has been. But there have been so many changes, in terms of visibility of the gay and trans community, compared to 20 years ago.”
Using Versace’s story as a base, The Assassination of Gianni Versace weaves in other narrative strands that delineate specific aspects of recent history. The fifth episode, for example, examines the impact of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, the US policy, introduced in Clinton’s presidency, that attempted to improve life for gay people in the military so long as they hid their sexuality, while openly banning gay people from serving. The episode zones in on the story of one former Marine who left the military because of his sexuality and became one of Cunanan’s victims after he spurned his advances. While that episode was being filmed, Donald Trump was revealing his new plan to ban transgender people from the military.
The series also serves as a dark comment on the celebrity culture that blossomed in the late Nineties, with Versace and his love for the spotlight right at the epicentre. “You see it in the frenzy when Versace is murdered,” says Jacobson.
“Something that should be an outpouring of grief and horror is turned into a commercialised event. People were stealing X-rays, just to have a connection to a famous person.”
Cunanan, too, was obsessed with status and wealth. “One of his traits early on is this absolute infatuation with fame; he was willing to kill for it,” says Orth. “What he was willing to do to become noticed, I don’t see it as that different to making a sex tape, like the Kardashians, or becoming US president because you were a reality TV star.”
Filmed, in part, on location in the Versace mansion – a lush, colourful, wildly over-the-top property – the show has a particularly colourful dramatis personae. Edgar Ramirez plays the designer, and Ricky Martin his long-time partner, the former model, Antonio D’Amico. Glee star Darren Criss is Cunanan, while Penélope Cruz plays the imperious Donatella Versace, Gianni’s sister, business partner and muse. It’s suffused with the same glossy eroticism that Versace epitomised.
There were tales of torrid parties and orgies behind closed doors, which Versace would task D’Amico with arranging, and which are referenced, although not shown, in the show. Such assertions may go some way to explaining the Versace family’s statement that Murphy’s drama “should only be considered as a work of fiction”.
Martin, however, believes that such alleged details of Versace’s private life should not be deemed shocking. “There is nothing wrong with a relationship being open,” he says. “You have got to evolve. And if this is what is needed for the relationship to be more solid, then why not try it?”
While the series will no doubt rekindle interest in the personal story of Versace, his fashion legacy remains undimmed. To mark 20 years since her brother’s murder, Donatella launched the Versace Tribute Collection at Milan Fashion Week last September. But the clothes were overshadowed by the finale: five of the original supermodels – Cindy Crawford, Naomi Campbell, Claudia Schiffer, Helena Christensen and the former French First Lady Carla Bruni – took to the catwalk. Social media lost its mind. Gianni would, no doubt, have heartily approved.
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American Crime Story: The Assassination of Gianni Versace S02E05: Don’t Ask Don’t Tell
JEFF TRAIL TAKES CENTRE STAGE IN A FANTASTIC EPISODE
When this season of American Crime Story began it was hard to imagine how it would compare to the popularity and acclaim of its first season. If anything, this season had a much tougher job than the first, tasked as it was with proving if this type of show could maintain said quality in the long term while telling distinct and different stories each season. Part of season two’s success is how different it is to The People v OJ Simpson. Instead of the equivalent of a Law and Order episode stretched to ten meticulously researched and dramatic hours, The Assassination of Gianni Versace has utilised the fact that, as a genre, crime is an environment for expansive story-telling.
The last two episodes, the first centring on the murders of Lee Miglin and William Reese, and the second on the murders of Jeff Trail and David Madson, have kicked the season into high gear by putting the victims of Andrew Cunanan front and centre. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell finally puts the spotlight on Andrew’s first victim, Jeff Trail.
To say that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is the best episode of the season may not mean that much coming from me, considering I felt the exact same way about the previous two, but that just goes to show what a hot streak American Crime Story is on at the moment. The story that is being told here, the different aspects that branch out from Andrew killing Versace, create a rich tapestry that the late designer would have been proud of, if he made tapestries that is.
Don’t Ask Don’t Tell’s main focus here is rejection filtered through the attitudes towards homosexuality in the early to mid-90s. It’s an episode of contrast, taking us through the different experiences that Gianni Versace and Jeff Trail went through when coming to terms with who they are.
We begin with Versace, as he reveals to his sister Donatella his plans to officially come out as gay through an interview with Advocate. So far, the Versace family, apart from Gianni’s death. Have been used to add flavour to the main story rather than be the main course themselves; which is surprising considering the heavyweight talent playing them. Gianni coming out here is used as a contrast to the fact that Jeff, living in completely different circumstances cannot. Of course, Donatella has her own suspicions about why her brother is choosing to come out now. Apart from rhyming off a list of ways that this revelation could hurt their business, something that didn’t actually come to pass, she outright accuses Antonio of using the it as an opportunity to achieve a kind of fame of his own, confirming in the process that these two never got along. Finally, Gianni shouts both of them down, saying that it was his idea, his decision, words that reverberate throughout the episode.
The point of Versace’s role in this episode is that he wasn’t rejected by the industry that made him a superstar. Before his death there was no other fashion designer whose image was as deeply connected to his brand as the clothes he made. He even became an icon in the gay community which is one of the reasons he came up on Andrew’s radar in the first place.
Jeff Trail is a different story all together. A decorated and respected Naval Officer, Jeff’s identity is just as defined by his career as it is his sexuality. The problem is that these two things are directly opposed to each other. Homophobia in the military was a such heights in the mid-90s that most gay officers hid their sexuality from their colleagues for fear of abuse. For Jeff this culminates in the bravest moment of his life, when he came to the aid of an officer who was being beaten to death because he was gay. Jeff admits in a 60 Minutes interview, in which his face is hidden, and his voice is distorted, that he wishes sometimes that he let the officer die: that way he could have stayed hidden. He eventually leaves the Navy because he can’t take hiding anymore, but that doesn’t mean that he can fully come out of the closet.
This is where Andrew comes in as we see his and Jeff’s first meeting. Andrew comes across as everything that Jeff wants to be: comfortable in the gay scene, confident, kind, and generous. It’s Andrew that points out the fallacy of Jeff having to hide in order to do the interview while the men against him and his gay colleagues are free to talk about killing faggots in full uniform. Andrew’s not wrong, although he is clearly manipulating Jeff into needing him more.
So, Jeff is rejected from what he sees as his true calling in life, he even keeps his naval uniform in a place of almost worship in his bedroom closet, if that isn’t symbolism then what is? Now it’s Andrew’s turn to be turned away from people he thought cared about him. After years of his lies and manipulations, he even sent Jeff’s father a postcard to try and out Jeff, he arrives in Minneapolis to see Jeff and David only to be continually turned away.
As well as these deep thematic discussions, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell also boasts the best performances of the season so far. Finn Wittrock, known for playing psychopaths on American Horror Story, broke my heart as Jeff. His turmoil and anxiety was palpable in a performance of tragically human proportions. He is the only actor so far that has come close to Darren Criss in terms of quality.
10/10 – American Crime Story continues to rewrite the crime genre’s rule book when it comes to adapting a true crime case. No other show has put this much effort into the killer’s victims, giving them full stories where other shows relegate them to gory crime scene photographs. Halfway through the season, and American Crime Story is already one of 2018’s most important shows.
American Crime Story: The Assassination of Gianni Versace S02E05: Don’t Ask Don’t Tell
The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story Review: Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (Season 2 Episode 5)
The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Season Season 2 Episode 5 “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is another heartbreaking episode which showcases the homophobia of the 1990s which had been in the background on previous episodes, but is now front and center.
“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is impeccably acted as always and it is interesting to see how Jeff Trail and Andrew Cunanan meet. We only saw Finn Wittrock as Jeff Trail very briefly in The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story Season 2 Episode 4 “The House by the Lake,” before Andrew brutally hammered him to death.
However, the timeline is still not working as well as it should. When the episode opens in 1995 with Versace telling Donatella he is going to come out, I was glad that we were getting back to the Versace storyline.
Any scene with Donatella is mesmerizing.
The scene illuminates the stigma of being gay and what it can do to a business, even in fashion, which now, we would see as an accepting industry. Donatella assumes that Antonio wants the fame of being recognized as Gianni’s boyfriend.
But Gianni insists that it is his idea. He almost died and now he wants to share his story.
It’s something he must do.
Versace is only present at the beginning of the episode and then at the end when we see how very different Gianni and Jeff’s stories are told to the press.
It is so sweet when Gianni calls Antonio over and introduces him to the journalist as his partner for the past thirteen years. I love Ricky Martin more and more with each episode he’s on.
Jeff Trail’s conversation with a CBS camera crew is in a dingy hotel compared to the beautiful hotel suite Gianni meets Advocate magazine in. Gianni will be on the cover of the magazine, whereas Jeff will be in shadows and his voice masked like “a criminal.”
Jeff Trail came from a military family and was serving in the Navy under the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy which prohibited the military from discriminating against closeted homosexuals, but at the same time banned openly gay and bisexual people from joining the military.
As we see Gianni and Antonio walk the hotel hallways on the way to the interview intercut with Jeff meeting journalists in secret, I had kind of forgotten that Versace had even been a part of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
The episode largely belongs to Jeff, but after Versace’s intro, we’re back to Andrew’s point of view, four days before the start of his murder spree.
Oh, and Andrew’s also injecting heroin.
As Andrew prepares to leave his life in San Diego, we see a typical serial killer shrine with images of Versace (including the Advocate cover) which shows that Versace was always a target. We also see that Andrew lives in a small room with very little possessions and a closet full of blazers.
He must keep up appearances.
The episode continues to jump between the fateful weekend Andrew comes to Minneapolis, the first time Andrew and Jeff meet, and Jeff’s time in the Navy.
I wish that we would have seen more of Andrew and Jeff’s relationship and how Jeff discovered that Andrew was a fraud.
The interview Jeff gives is a big moment on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” however, we see it three times. First, we actually see the incident Jeff talks about where he came to the aid of a fellow sailor who was getting beat up for being gay.
Then, Andrew watches the CBS tape where Jeff confides that he wishes he hadn’t saved the sailor’s life because it ended his military career.
And then, we hear the story again in the motel room with Jeff and the journalists.
It’s too repetitive and when we see Jeff tell the TV crew about the incident at the same time as Versace comes out to the world, Jeff’s story doesn’t make as big as an impact as it should.
What does make an impact is when Jeff tells Andrew that he has no honor.
The look on Andrew’s face is murderous.
Even more so when Jeff says, “No one wants your love.”
We don’t know why Andrew is the way he is but his motivation for murder is somewhat clear. He kills men who he either wanted to out, who he envied, or who he thought wronged him.
“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is a good episode because of the way it handles the subject matter. The execution, however, however, is too clunky. It is too repetitive at times and Jeff and Andrew’s relationship could have been explored a little further.
Reviewer Rating: 3½ / 5 stars
‘American Crime Story: Versace’ recap: ‘House by the Lake’ – TheCelebrityCafe.com
When hearing the phrase “House by the Lake,” it’s most likely associated with good memories for most people. Something cozy, like a nice cabin perhaps. A place to relax and let life slow down.
But Andrew Cunanan is not most people, and from this point forward “House by the Lake” is going to mean something much, much different for him.
The fourth episode of American Crime Story: Versace — “House by the Lake” — once again dives further into Andrew’s past, before he ever met Gianni (it’s a little strange how Versace in is the title of the show and we’ve barely seen him the past couple of weeks, but we’re willing to roll with it).
This episode takes place one week before everything that went down with Lee in episode three happened — showing Andrew in a far more vulnerable state.
Andrew is living with David Madson (Cody Fern) — a young architect (he’s really got a thing for architects) whom Andrew seems to be head-over-heels in love with. David, apparently, doesn’t feel the same way as he’s starting to grow tired of their relationship and is looking for a way to escape Andrew’s requests for marriage.
The two are sharing some tense moments in David’s apartment — David receiving a promotion and trying then trying leave, Andrew standing around acting all creepy — when their friend Jeff (Finn Wittrock) knocks on the door. David’s confused why he’s here, but Andrew says he invited him over pretty much just out of spite: he’s pretty sure David is cheating on him with Jeff, and he wants to give the two “a chance to talk about me.”
A frustrated David goes downstairs to let Jeff in. They talk about how weird Andrew has been lately and head back into the apartment — which is where Andrew is waiting with a hammer.
BAM. Down goes Jeff. A couple of bloody blows to the head later, and he’s out for good.
David is horrified and doesn’t know how to react. Andrew quickly reassures him that he’s not going to kill him because he still loves him and all that. Sure Andrew, sure.
Still in shock, David thinks they should call the police but Andrew won’t hear for it. He tells him that they’ll both be locked up — David let Jeff in, it’s his hammer and cops hate gay people, and Andrew couldn’t live with himself if David had to go to prison. Oh yeah, Andrew has a gun too — one he stole from Jeff at one point — which further convinces David to go along with Andrew’s schemes.
After an awkward dog walk, the two wind up making a run for it. Good thing too, because it’s not long after the crime is committed that the police come knocking on David’s door.
At first, they assume that David’s body is the one they’ve stumbled upon. Then, after noticing the hair color doesn’t match, they make the next logical conclusion — it’s Andrew’s body. Upon this realization, they instantly run out of the apartment: they don’t have a warrant to be here, meaning anything they discover at this time won’t hold up in a court of law.
Finally, after they get a warrant and send the body down to the lab, they learn the truth: it’s Jeff. They send out an APB for Andrew and David, both of whom are long gone at this point.
Long gone, on their way to Chicago to try and get some money from Andrew’s friend Lee (sound familiar?) David is still a part of all of this, despite his constant confusion. We’re constantly seen flashbacks of him and his dad — a scene in which their hunting, another in which David comes out to him .
After stopping in a restaurant and hearing a cover of “Drive” by The Cars that makes Andrew breakdown and cry (which is, by far, the most emotion we’ve ever seen from Andrew. Maybe he isn’t as remorseless as we’ve been lead to believe), David — who had the chance to escape out a bathroom window — finally commits to the situation and returns to Andrew.
At least, he did in that moment, only to realize his mistake later. The next morning, David sees Andrew holding his gun — which he promised not to use as long as David was around. Andrew won’t admit to what he was doing, which then causes David to crack. He lets him know how much of a manipulator and terrible person Andrew is, how he killed Jeff just because he was in love with him.
Huge mistake. Huge. Like, yeah, David is right and everything but saying that face-to-face with a psycho killer probably isn’t the best idea in the world.
That’s what leads them to a house. After driving in tension for awhile, Andrew pulls over by a lake and drags David out of the car. David begs for his life, but there’s no saving him at this point.
David makes a run for it — and for a moment it looks like he might make it. We see David imagine that he makes it inside a nearby house, only to find his father there, offering him a cup of coffee. The illusion is touching, but only last a second. We snap back to reality to find David has been shot in the back and is bleeding out. Andrew lays with his corpse for awhile, only to then get back in the car and continue to his journey to Chicago. Look out Lee. Look out Versace.
‘American Crime Story: Versace’ recap: ‘House by the Lake’ – TheCelebrityCafe.com
‘American Crime Story’ Takes a Deeper Dive Into Jeff Trail’s Life Before His Murder
These past two weeks, American Crime Story has put forth two incredibly beautiful and heartbreaking episodes about the deaths that kicked off Andrew Cunanan’s murder spree, those of Jeff Trail and David Madson.
Madson was front and center last week, showing what ACS producers think most likely happened to him after Trail’s murder in his loft, interspersed with scenes of Madson and his father. This week, it’s Trail’s turn in the spotlight, as the show reveals his struggle as a gay naval officer and the way he met Cunanan.
Flashing back two years before his murder, we see Trail serving active duty in the Navy, stationed in San Diego. This is around the time when “don’t ask, don’t tell” was a new policy, but by all appearances, Trail loves his life in the military, even if it means hiding who he really is. That changes when he stops some fellow servicemen from beating another serviceman to death for being gay. This puts a huge target on Trail’s back and basically torpedoes his career.
The show makes it seem as though Trail meets Cunanan at a local gay bar and confides in him that he’s going to do an interview with CBS News program 48 Hours about gay people serving in the military. Cunanan makes a big show of talking about how servicemen who are against LGBTQ+ people in the military get to speak about it openly, while Trail has to hide his identity in order to even talk about the issue.
It’s a great point, though, weirdly, the timeline is a bit off. The 48 Hours special was filmed in 1993, which is around the time Cunanan and Trail met — not in 1995, as the show depicts, which may just be an error. There is also no evidence that Cunanan had anything to do with Trail’s decision to do the interview, but it does make for good storytelling and gets Cunanan more involved in Trail’s life in San Diego.
The show then jumps ahead to 1997, when Trail is already living in Minneapolis and Cunanan has come to visit him. It’s unclear if Cunanan’s jealousy over Trail and Madson’s alleged involvement started before he came to Minneapolis or after, but the show definitely uses that as the fuel that drives Cunanan to kill them both, though, in real life, the two were not involved. According to multiple accounts, the two were acquainted but not really even friends.
But Cunanan suspects the two are together romantically behind his back, so he invites Trail to Madson’s loft, and that’s where the episode ends for this story line, with Cunanan slamming the apartment door as he starts beating Trail to death with a hammer.
Outside of Trail’s story, we also get a few scenes with Gianni Versace after two weeks without any Versace material. This week, his experiences as a gay man dovetail nicely with Trail’s experience — they both give interviews about being gay, but while Trail has to conduct his in a seedy motel room with his face obscured by shadow, Versace, a celebrity, does his in a posh hotel suite with a glamorous photo shoot for The Advocate.
American Crime Story may be about Cunanan’s murder spree at its heart, but there is a thread running through it of the struggles gay men faced in the 1990s, as the movement itself was coming out of the closet and met with both support and violent hatred.
The juxtaposition of Trail and Versace is such an interesting framing device that it’s almost a shame we have to spend any time with Cunanan in this episode. Yes, he is the tie that binds all these men together, and Criss is doing an incredible job with the role, but his self-hatred and jealousy and the psychopathic way they manifest themselves is so ugly and manipulative and even jarring. It would have been nice to avoid him altogether for a week.
‘American Crime Story’ Takes a Deeper Dive Into Jeff Trail’s Life Before His Murder
American Crime Story
Like its predecessor American Horror Story, American Crime Story comes in the form of a miniseries. While its first season explored America’s racial divisions through the OJ Simpson case, this new series depicts the gay experience in the USA.
The Horror Story miniseries always had an appealing base narrative, although it tended to sag after a few episodes. Crime Story, by contrast, has had a better reception overall – perhaps because its grounding in historical events means it has less room to get lost.
This second series, subtitled ‘The Assassination of Gianni Versace’, begins with the 1997 murder of fashion designer Gianni Versace outside his house in Miami, before spinning backwards (and forwards) to tell the story of his psychopathic killer, Andrew Cunanan (Darren Criss), and the impact of Versace’s death on his sister, Donatella, who is – to many viewers’ excitement – played by Penelope Cruz. Another notable appearance is Ricky Martin as Gianni’s long-term partner.
Unfortunately, Criss’ Cunanan lacks flavour: within 15 minutes he has exhibited every symptom of Borderline Personality Disorder, and it’s a bit too textbook, relying on shocking acts to provide psychopathic bite.
However, the show comes together around Cruz’s Donatella, who is a strong presence and provides the intrigue to power the first few episodes.There is a beauty to this show. It was filmed in and outside the grotesquely sumptuous Miami house where Versace lived and on the steps where he would eventually die. The contrast between the world inside the villa and the world outside, from Cunanan’s viewpoint, symbolises the contrast in gay men’s experiences.
Aesthetically it feels like a telenovela or a Pedro Almodóvar film, whilst on a more spiritual level it brings insight into the two Versaces, and both depictions have depth. Cunanan is a bit Crimewatch-esque, although all could change as the nine episode series continues and develops the rest of his story which involves, among other things, a four-man murder spree.
Alhough the key word in any of these ‘American -whatever- Story’ shows is ‘trashy’, in this case it works. The show has valid points to make about celebrity culture, such as the unpleasant couple who ask Gianni for his autograph on the day of his death. After he refuses, they manage later to mop up some of his blood onto a scrap of paper, showing perhaps how fame transcends or even thrives on death. Overall, it is a promising and unpredictable show that has a few cards left up its sleeve.
AMERICAN CRIME STORY Review: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”
This week’s episode of American Crime Story: The Assassination of Gianni Versace looked like it was going to buck the recent trend of going backwards in time to see what Versace murderer Andrew Cunanan was up to before he got to Miami Beach. It opened in Milan in 1995, with Versace himself (still very much alive then) arguing with his sister Donatella about his decision to give an interview with an American publication in which he will reveal he is gay. His lover (and assistant) Antonio D’Amico is present as well.
This is the first time we have seen these characters in a number of weeks, as the previous few episodes focused entirely on Andrew’s backstory. So it was a pleasure to see them pop up here. It is a curious decision to put names like Penelope Cruz and Ricky Martin on the bench, so I was fully anticipating an episode devoted in full to the story of Versace’s coming out.
Nope. Totally wrong. After the cold open in which Versace and Donatella have a heated exchange over what his coming out might mean for the company, we flash back to a few days before Jeff Trail is murdered in Minneapolis (brutally with a hammer by Andrew Cunanan, which we saw last week). Cunanan is on the phone with a credit card company representative trying to convince them to let him put one last charge on his card: a flight to Minneapolis, where he assures them he will be able to make his debt right.
Meanwhile in Minneapolis, we see that Jeff is working a factory job. A coworker who he lunches with starts prying about Jeff’s past military experience. Jeff tells him he was an Officer and his friend wonders why he would leave that gig to come work here. Jeff is gets fired up pretty quickly, screaming at the man “It was MY choice!” He really makes a scene. As we know, especially from the title of the episode “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” Jeff has most likely been dishonorably discharged from the military for being homosexual.
Soon Andrew is arriving in town, and Jeff and the fellow future Andrew victim David are at the airport to greet him. It’s clear that neither one of them wants much to do with Cunanan at this point, but Jeff speaks about a time where Andrew saved him, and so for old time’s sake is willing to put him up for a couple days. Andrew is all smiles of course, but it’s an eerie feeling the viewer gets realizing that within days this smiling man will be the end of both people there to welcome him.
The episode has its ups and downs in that we know where all this is leading. At times this makes it a little more dull than the last few episodes. At times it adds to the tension. We knew last week that Andrew had taken Jeff’s gun from his apartment without his permission, and the night he kills Jeff, Jeff comes to David’s apartment to retrieve the gun. So this week we see a scene in which Andrew goes through Jeff’s things. I’m not sure we needed to.
Much more interesting is the stuff with Jeff. We get a full backstory to this character, going back to when he was stationed on a ship in San Diego and decided to intervene when some of his fellow soldiers were beating another one to death for being gay. It’s a courageous act, but it is the very act that he later comes to regret. That sets off a chain of events that eventually leads to his death. People begin suspecting that he may, in fact, be gay. When he hears a fellow soldier who turned out to be gay cut a deal with the higher-ups to reveal everyone else he knew to be gay, but he would only be identifying them by their tattoos, Jeff sneaks away and literally tries to cut the tattoo on his leg off his body. It’s excruciating but speaks to his desperation.
Sadly, Jeff tries to hang himself. When he can’t do it, he heads to a gay bar for the first time ever. That’s where he meets the charming Andrew Cunanan. In the most interesting scene, we see Andrew lift Jeff’s spirits and we’re happy for him. But we also know that one day Andrew is going to bludgeon him to death with a hammer. Eventually, due to his meeting with Andrew, Jeff gets the courage to go on camera (though his face is not revealed) and speak about his time as a homosexual man in the military. He painfully laments how he regrets the greatest thing he ever did: saving that man from being beaten to death. This interview is paralleled by Versace’s own interview where he comes out of the closet; one with tentative pride and one with utter shame.
This is really what this series is all about. It’s zoomed in on specific character stories that speak to what was going on in America and the world at the time. That’s what The People Vs. O.J. did so well, and what I was worried this second season would fall flat with. But I stand corrected. These are important stories and interesting ones. And the show just keeps getting better.
TB gives it an A
‘The Assassination of Gianni Versace’ episode 5 recap: Asked and told
**Warning for images of self harm and attempted suicide in this recap**
The arc of time always endorses progress, but it’s amazing how long it can take to get from “no way” to “no duh.” Obviously, in 2018 we agree that women should be allowed to vote and people of color should have access to drinking fountains etc., but those basic things took decades of horrible, hateful ‘debate’ until they were suddenly accepted as common wisdom. Gay people can now serve openly in the military thanks to a ‘radical’ policy change by President Obama and it already feels like such a no-brainer that people don’t even really debate it anymore. Yet that policy change followed a hundred years of institutionalized homophobia, unreported assaults, murders, and dishonorable discharges. This week’s episode of The Assassination of Gianni Versace whisked us back to those dark times and as difficult as it was to watch, it felt valuable and necessary to truly appreciate how much better things are now. Let’s talk about it!
We began with Donatella Versace completely queening out.
Gianni had just informed her that he was intending to ‘come out’ in the press, and rather than applaud him for his bravery, Donatella was VERY concerned about the company’s bottom line. In her opinion, the rock stars and literal royalty they’d been dressing would not want to be associated with a gay designer. That is obviously an insane line of reasoning today — A gay person? In fashion?? — but in her mind it made sense. Fortunately, Gianni was still feeling grateful to be alive after nearly succumbing to AIDS-related symptoms and in his mind coming out would be a celebration of life. It would also, it appeared, trigger a certain psychopath’s obsessions with him.
That same Advocate article in which Versace came out as a homosexual had been hastily taped up in the back of Andrew Cunanan’s closet. And considering his apartment was empty save for trash bags and tattered underwear, the presence of these magazine pages made clear that Versace was still on his radar in a big way.
Also, he was deeply in debt and he’d taken to shooting up heroin between his toes, both of which were bad signs. Andrew Cunanan’s journey had definitely taken a detour through some dark woods.
We then met up with Jeff Trail (an incredible Finn Wittrock) working at some kind of compressed gas factory. During a testy lunch conversation with a coworker, we gathered that his post-military career had been less-than-prestigious compared to his Annapolis peers and he honestly didn’t want to talk about it, thank you.
After conning his credit card company into allowing him one last purchase (a flight to Minneapolis!), Cunanan arrived attempting to resume his BFF-status with Jeff Trail and David Madson. But it became immediately clear neither of them wanted to see him. In Jeff’s case, it was because apparently Cunanan had sent a postcard to Jeff’s dad ostensibly OUTING HIM. (A true gay psycho power play if there ever was one.) And David was just straight up tired of getting proposed to by someone who made his stomach turn.
You know? Like, thank you for the $10,000 Rolex you clearly stole from a trick, but I’d rather not enter into a joint tax status with you.
Even though Jeff couldn’t even stand to look at Cunanan, he agreed to let him crash at his place. But he had no intention of actually being there, as he then couch surfed at this pregnant sister’s house. She was about to give birth any minute, and he was excited to become a proud gay uncle. There was not yet an Instagram back then, but just imagine all the gay uncle photos he’d post around the holidays! Things were looking bright.
It was pretty awkward when David took Andrew out that night, and Andrew couldn’t stop bragging to David’s co-workers that they were engaged. David had made the mistake of replying to his constant proposals with “TBD” but Andrew took that as a yes. Anyway, it was so stressful to me. But I DID enjoy this lady absolutely wailing on a clarinet. Go girl!
Back at Jeff’s place, Andrew was the world’s worst houseguest and immediately began going through all of Jeff’s stuff. He found the gun, obviously, but he also found David’s old Navy uniform along with a VHS tape of the CBS special he’d appeared in (anonymously) talking about being gay in the military. And even though to us it was a brave document of being a closeted soldier in a time when that could get you killed, Andrew seemed resentful and hateful toward Jeff, pointing a gun at the TV instead. Truly twisted.
We then flashed back to Jeff’s time in the Navy, specifically the series of incidents in which another gay naval officer was routinely assaulted by his comrades and only Jeff stepped in to stop it. Jeff was doing the right thing in helping his peer, but this immediately painted a target on his back for being another potential gay. And things got worse when gay soldiers began to name names in order to avoid dishonorable discharge. Or, in certain cases, named tattoos.
Oh god. Jeff cut off his tattoo with a box cutter. That alone should tell you how intense this was getting.
Around this time the Navy decided to kinda-sorta address homosexuality in the military by distributing comic books that dramatized “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” At the time I think people thought this policy would protect the inner lives of gay servicemen, but in retrospect, we know that it led to more discharges and persecution than ever before.
So, yeah. Things were pretty bleak. (Spoiler: Jeff did not end up hanging himself in this scene.)
Ironically, one of the saving graces in Jeff’s turmoil came when he encountered a bright and personable guy at a local gay bar. The thing with sociopaths is sometimes they use their gift/curse for the betterment of others, and in this case, Andrew Cunanan was just the fun-night-out that Jeff needed to feel like himself. And over the course of several hangs, we got the sense that Jeff was ready to embrace his sexuality and even go so far as to appear in a television interview that could potentially get him kicked out of the military. In other words, he was ready for the runway.
Loved this visual reference to Get Out. I love that from now on, anytime someone eats Froot Loops while sitting cross-legged will be forever marked as a psycho. And yeah, when Jeff arrived back at his now-messy apartment to find Andrew doing this, guess what he said? “Get out!” Even though all those years ago Andrew had been a friendly face at a gay bar, he was now overstaying his welcome in Jeff’s life. And unfortunately for Jeff, he was too honest about this fact.
Because as we learned last week, after Andrew lured Jeff to David’s loft with the promise of returning his handgun (Jeff, c’mon. Did you really think Andrew had placed the gun in his duffel “accidentally”?) he suddenly found himself on the business end of a hammer. Really terrible.
And the tragic button was that while Jeff’s mangled corpse was lying wrapped in a rug, his sister went into labor and gave birth. Damn.
“Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” was another wonderful exploration of the life and trials of one of Cunanan’s victims, and it was especially elegantly told. Tying together Versace’s coming-out interview with Jeff Trail’s staying-in interview was the perfect way to describe the exact nature of being closeted in 1997. If even wealthy, super successful artists struggled to make that leap, how on earth could an everyman in the military do it? It was an untenable situation, and like many other elements of gay life in the ’90s, it contributed to the environment that pushed Andrew Cunanan to commit the crimes he did. There’s still a long way to go before homosexuality is a non-issue with some people, but this episode was a lovely and painful reminder that things really have gotten better. Hopefully, we can keep that going.
‘The Assassination of Gianni Versace’ episode 5 recap: Asked and told
THE ASSASSINATION OF GIANNI VERSACE Review: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” | Birth.Movies.Death.
We’ve spent the last two hours of The Assassination of Gianni Versace without getting a glimpse of its namesake (Édgar Ramírez), so when “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” welcomes the iconic fashion designer back into the fold of his own story, it’s undoubtedly a welcome sight (even if the scene in question again revolves around him arguing with his sister, Donatella [Penélope Cruz]). Gianni wants to announce his homosexuality to the world, having survived a bout with AIDS and grasping that it’s no good to simply live however many days he has left in the shadows. His lover and partner for over a decade, Antonio D’Amico (Ricky Martin), stands by Gianni’s side, and Donatella instantly blames him. He wants to be famous. He cannot stand to be a side player. She implores Gianni to think about the company (which is about to go public on the NYSE) – not to mention the future of all his employees – before sitting down and delivering what could be a devastating declaration.
This season of American Crime Story has been incredibly political, and “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” dials the “serial killer procedural” element down a notch to focus on issues of class within the gay community, and how those standings affect individuals looking to come out of the closet. For Versace, it’s an event – an interview in The Advocate where he demands Antonio be by his side during the entire chat – reclaiming his own sense of identity after cheating death for a little more time on the planet. But for future Andrew Cunanan (Darren Criss) victim Jeffrey Trail (Finn Wittrock), his public revelation is an act of defiance against a military that’s not only called him and others like him a “faggot”, but also beaten enlisted sailors within an inch of their lives once their sexualities were discovered. As an enlisted officer in the Navy, Trail had to live his truth in shameful silence, before rescuing a subordinate after he was ritualistically bludgeoned by his peers.
The threat of outing within the military – an act that would cost Trail not only his career, but possibly his family (as many members in his bloodline served, as well) – even forces Jeff to mutilate his body. After another officer tells the tale of a recently arrested colleague outing sailors based on the tattoos he recalled seeing during sexual encounters with other men, Jeff takes a box cutter and tries to carve some ink off his leg, leading him to bleed through his uniform while sitting in the Captain’s quarters, where a pamphlet on Naval ethics and code of conduct is being handed out to every man who owns a leadership position on his ship. When Jeff decides to finally break his silence and give an interview to television reporters, it comes with the stipulation that his face be blacked out and his voice altered. It’s a far cry from the well-lit, welcoming photo shoot the gay publication sets up for Versace.
These political explorations are a welcome respite from the exploits of Andrew Cunanan, who – despite being compellingly played by Criss every episode – was starting to become a little bit of a repetitive character (though, to be fair, he’s also a serial killer, so routine is kind of his thing). The non-linear structure, while often clever, does “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” zero favors, muddying some of the relationships. We see Jeff first through Andrew’s eyes, as he cons his way into a trip to Minneapolis (on American Express’ dime) in a last-ditch attempt at having a normal life by marrying the focus of last week’s episode (not to mention Trail’s best friend and lover), David Madson (Cody Fern). We already know how this all ends, so there’s a bit of wheel-spinning going on as Jeff gives Andrew a less-than-fuzzy reception at the airport, and we recognize he’s right to be distrustful of the sociopathic pretty boy.
So, why spend all this time illustrating Andrew’s relationship to Jeff? One could argue Andrew – no matter how evil and deadly he is – still definitely played an oddly positive role in the Navy man’s life. Andrew meets Jeff during the first time the officer steps into a gay bar. Andrew shows him the ropes (so to speak) regarding his queerness; proving to Jeff that his sexuality isn’t awful, and that not everybody is going to hate him for being gay. Eventually, Jeff is the only one who spots Andrew spinning his web of lies, while David can’t help but want to help his fellow queer. A susceptibility to this series of wild stories is what ends up costing both Jeff and David their lives, as Andrew begins doling out another new legend of needing to begin anew in San Francisco, all so he can get inside David’s apartment and wait there like a patient predator. The fictions keep driving him forward, allowing Andrew to set traps for new prey.
Beyond class, the friendships Jeff forms between Andrew and David illustrate just how difficult it is to come out of the closet on basic principle alone for some gay men. On one hand, they have the morals and values they’ve been instilled with throughout their lives – represented by Jeff’s commitment to his familial institution, the military. He looks to the red, white, and blue, wanting to be a Good American in a United States that has said (from the President on down) that they don’t want his kind representing it in combat. On the other hand, David is a successful openly gay man, and Andrew has no problem embracing his sexuality. “The bars, the meals, the men. Everything you gave me means nothing,” Jeff tells Andrew at one point, finishing with, “I want my life back. My real life, as a soldier.” For some, self-acceptance was just as impossible as societal acceptance, and Jeff Trail’s life ended while he was still in a state of spiritual limbo, wrestling with his own truth every night, before waking up and going to work at a factory with the other vets, who he’d continue to keep his secret from.
THE ASSASSINATION OF GIANNI VERSACE Review: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” | Birth.Movies.Death.
Uncovering The Spoilers Buried In The Music Of American Crime Story: Versace
Showrunner Ryan Murphy decided to start The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story with the titular designer’s death. For the first eight minutes of the show, there is minimal talking. We hear only the greetings as Versace (Edgar Ramírez) encounters various characters at the start of his day and the screams of Andrew Cunanan (Darren Criss), who was in the midst of a killing spree targeting gay men. What overwhelms our senses are the sounds of “Adagio in G Minor,” a haunting piece of baroque, Italian composition that we’ve all heard on screen many times, from Flashdance to Casanova to Manchester by the Sea. Though effective, it is not a particularly original choice. But, another layer is added to the story ACS: Versace is telling us if you explore the murky history of this piece of music.
“There were a couple of others we were trying, all in the same classical, Italian landscape,” the show’s music supervisor, Amanda Krieg Thomas, told Refinery29 on a recent phone call. Murphy, who directed the first episode, chose to set the sequence to a single piece of music and had the show’s composer, Mac Quayle, record a new version of this song to picture, so the arrangement matches up perfectly with the action.
There is a duality to watching a man who will lie, steal, and kill to serve his own ends execute another man in a moment scored by someone who perpetrated the most significant scam in classical music history. A musicologist named Remo Giazotto claims to have discovered the adagio, circa 1949. Giazotto was writing a book on the 18th-century Venetian master Tomaso Albinoni and said he had found this fragment of music in his archives, consisting of six bars of a melody. Giazotto took the liberty of finishing the composition, and the “Adagio in G Minor” was born. Except that Giazotto’s story wasn’t true. There is no proof to support that Albinoni wrote that fragment of music. Giazotto retracted his story later in life and took sole credit for the piece.
When it comes to pop music, of which the show has an abundance, powerhouse female vocalists from the late ‘80s and early ’90s are the stars in ACS: Versace. “It’s different from The People Versus O.J. Simpson in every way, but that show was a snapshot of the period, and that’s what we did for it musically as well. This season, the vision from Murphy was more focused on Cunanan and the type of music he would have grown up with; songs that would have been around him and in the places he went to that he’d be listening to,” Krieg Thomas says. The universe of ACS: Versace is aurally made up of women: club and radio jams by Lisa Stansfield, La Bouche, Indeep, Soul II Soul, and Jocelyn Enriquez all make appearances. And, of course, Laura Branigan whose cover (with its rewritten English lyrics) of “Gloria” became a hit in 1982. Her take is revived in episode 2, when Cunanan blasts it while he sings along in a stolen truck, taken from a man he killed.
“Murphy is such a fan of music, and for many of the moments, he knew what he wanted. ‘Gloria’ was one of those; he’s a big Laura Branigan fan,” Krieg Thomas said, which is probably not something anyone has said in decades. Her assertion bears itself out, though; the show uses another Branigan track, a No. 1 hit that has been all but forgotten in modern times, “You Take My Self Control,” in a future episode. “It works really well on many levels — it’s so incongruous with what just happened, he’s murdered people, he’s driving, and we hear this happy, upbeat song,” Krieg Thomas continued. She noted that the lyrics speak to what is happening: “Gloria, you’re always on the run now / Running after somebody, you gotta get him somehow” and “Gloria, don’t you think you’re fallin’? / If everybody wants you, why isn’t anybody callin’?”
A checking of the boxes (fits the show’s aesthetic, lyrically speaks to the scene) is noticeable at numerous moments in the first two episodes alone. “Last Night A DJ Saved My Life” plays when Cunanan meets Versace in a club in San Francisco, letting us know something is afoot. “Be My Lover” plays while Cunanan fruitlessly searches for Versace in a South Beach club in a fit of desperation. It’s a sickening foreshadowing when Phil Collins & Phillip Bailey’s “Easy Lover” plays as Cunanan ties up and dominates a john. Under the Miami Vice aesthetic of this ’80s hit lies a cautionary tale about a lover who will leave and deceive, giving you nothing but regrets. As for talk that it might be an homage to American Psycho, Krieg Thomas said, “although it’s pulled from the same easy listening palette, it wasn’t a reference point.”
In episodes 3, 4, and 5, the soundtrack pivots to speak to us about the other men Cunanan killed: Lee Miglin (Mike Farrell), Jeffrey Trail (Finn Wittrock), and David Madson (Cody Fern). With Lee, it’s a resetting of the aesthetic by using songs coded for older gay men; where Doris Day and Astrud Gilberto play on the hi-fi. With Trail and Madson, the work is largely done by the show’s score, which sets a mood of horror to match the change in cinematography to the darker, harsher tones of Minnesota sunlight and Madson’s industrial loft. In episode 4, the foreshadowing is heavy when Madson and Cunanan are in a bar listening to Aimee Mann sing the saddest version imaginable of “Drive,” a morose uber-hit for the Cars in the ’80s. Madson’s tears along with the lyrics, “Who’s gonna pay attention / To your dreams? / Who’s gonna plug their ears / When you scream?” let us know that there was no escape. Not to the outside world where gay men were vilified, and not with Cunanan on a Bonnie and Clyde-esque murder spree.
The show uses music to tell us about Versace, as well. His South Beach soundscape is not so different from Cunanan’s, full of club music and dance hits but with flourishes of Italian classical dropped in to remind us where he comes from. In episode 2, there was a moment where the real Versace spoke. In another theme for this show, that of cover songs, they lifted a track that Versace used in his final fashion show for the scene with Donatella (Penélope Cruz), dropping the Lightning Seeds cover of “You Showed Me” in after their big fight over models and how to build a fashion brand. Reports have the siblings fighting quite a lot at the time, with Donatella trying to find her place in the house of Versace after her brother’s return upon his recovery from an illness. The use of this song in his real life may have simply been reaching for what was in the air at the time — it was the height of Britpop, and in his other shows he had used adjacent tracks like “Wonderwall” by Oasis. Or, it might have been a carefully constructed message to his sister. That we even ask the question, however, is entirely thanks to its presence in the American Crime Story universe.
Uncovering The Spoilers Buried In The Music Of American Crime Story: Versace
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