Tag: variety

Ryan Murphy Responds to Versace Family Calling ‘American Crime Story’ Fiction

Ryan Murphy has responded to the Versace family calling his anthology drama “The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story” a work of fiction, by saying he doesn’t believe that to be true.

“We issued a statement saying that this story is based on Maureen Orth’s book, which is a very celebrated, lauded work of non-fiction that was vetted now for close to 20 years,” Murphy told Variety at the premiere event for the FX anthology drama in Los Angeles, Calif. “That’s really all I have to say about it, other than of course I feel if you’re family is ever portrayed in something, it’s natural to sort of have a ‘Well, let’s wait and see what happens’ [stance].”

Murphy also pointed out that on Sunday Donatella Versace, the fashion icon’s sister and vice president and chief designer of the Versace Group, made a complimentary gesture towards series star Penelope Cruz, who portrays her in the show and has long been acquainted with her.

“Donatella Versace sent Penelope Cruz a very large arrangement of flowers yesterday when she was representing the show at the Golden Globes,” Murphy said. “I don’t know if she is going to watch the show, but if she did I think that she would see that we treat her and her family with respect and kindness. She really is a feminist role model in my book, because she had to step into an impossible situation, which she did with grace and understanding. I think that she really loved Penelope and knows that Penelope would never do anything to represent her in a negative light. Hopefully she’ll read what I’m saying to you.”

Executive producer Brad Simpson said he feels that the Versaces are certainly allowed to have their own opinion of the series and fully expected a reaction from the “real victims and real families.”

“This isn’t authorized, and we don’t make any pretense at it being authorized,” Simpson said. “This is based on Maureen Orth’s book. She’s an incredibly respected journalist. It’s a non-fiction bestseller. And also, we’re not just telling the story of Versace. We’re telling the story of all the lives that were affected by the murders of Andrew Cunanan. They’re entitled to feel how they want to feel, but we stand by the veracity of the show.”

Orth, who also attended the premiere, had been working on the Cunanan case in advance of Versace’s shocking murder in July 1997. The spree killer had already left behind a string of at least four other victims.

“I had done two months of investigation for Vanity Fair because I just thought he was a very interesting, killer suspect – because here’s a guy who went to Bishop in La Jolla. He had a 147 IQ and he had tons of friends, he was extremely witty and well-read. What the heck is he doing being a suspect? Then, when he killed Versace, I was the only one who really knew that they had met before, and so then the whole media circus took off,” Orth said.

Executive producer Nina Simpson feels the way the show portrays all of the victims – including but not limited to Versace – will emphasize “the value and meaning of the lives lost.”

“There’s nothing casual about our portrayal of these folks, and I think that people will feel their loss even more,” Jacobson said.

And screenwriter Tom Rob Smith said that while the Versace family’s statement referenced their objections to Orth’s book, he wasn’t sure “if they were referencing the show directly.”

“I think there’s always this question of when you’re making and writing this kind of material – you feel like you want to support the fundamental truths,” said Smith. “And you are going to get some of the details wrong, or you’re going to have to fill in a gap at some point, where you don’t have access to the reality. I think the only way you are allowed to do that is if you’re supporting the bigger truth.”

For Smith, and therefore the show he set out to make, that bigger truth is that Versace was an amazing man. “The show is full of love for him,” Smith said. “I’m sure there are points where they could correct some of the smaller details, but I think the bigger picture is that this is a figure that we’re celebrating and a figure that we all fell in love with.”

Ryan Murphy Responds to Versace Family Calling ‘American Crime Story’ Fiction

‘Assassination of Gianni Versace’ Team on Exploring ‘What Went Wrong’ That Made Andrew Cunanan Kill

The latest installment of FX and Ryan Murphy’s anthology drama “American Crime Story,” “The Assassination of Gianni Versace,” starts with the murder of the fashion icon (played here by Edgar Ramirez), but that is just the jumping off point for a deep dive into a handful of horrific crimes committed by Andrew Cunanan (played by Darren Criss) in the 1990s.

“This case is famous because of the murder of Versace,” executive producer Tom Rob Smith said at FX’s Television Critics Assn. press tour Friday in Pasadena, Calif. “That’s all I knew, but it was the tip of the iceberg.”

Smith, alongside executive producers Murphy, Brad Simpson and Nina Jacobson used Maureen Orth’s 1999 book “Vulgar Favors: Andrew Cunanan, Gianni Versace, and the Largest Failed Manhunt in US History” as research and the basis for the nine-episode series.

Since Cunanan’s victims were no longer alive to confirm exactly how events took place, Smith, who also wrote the episodes, pieced together the facts from Orth’s book and imagined what might have happened in between the gaps. “We have these tiny points of truth, and you try to connect the tissue between them, but I would never use the term ’embellish,‘” Smith said.

While Simpson pointed out that Versace is a “thread that goes all the way through” all nine episodes, the show is designed to be an ensemble, and they wanted to pay respect to all of Cunanan’s victims, including Lee Miglin (Mike Farrell), David Madson (Cody Fern) and Jeffrey Trail (Finn Wittrock). “Each victims were tragic in their own way,” he said.

Although the show follows Cunanan as he dips in and out of these other men’s lives (and ultimately takes their lives), Simpson noted they didn’t want to put his name in the title because it felt like it would have been “elevating him to a place we didn’t want to put him.”

Jacobson points out the title of the series really points to the contrast between Cunanan and the high-profile victim who made him famous. “Some of the themes [in the series are] the contrasts between Cunanan and Versace in the destroyer and the curator. One character is an authentic, honest creator drawing on his heritage, his background his family… and the other goes on a path of destruction because he wants the fame without the work or the talent,” she said.

Jacobson also felt strongly that Versace did not have to die but the homophobia at the time allowed the prior victims’ cases to be mishandled or under-investigated. “Cunanan was going out clubbing right across the street from the police department. The neglect and the isolation and the ‘otherness’ in the way the police handled the deaths of gay men, with the exception of one of the victims, [made Versace’s death] a death that didn’t have to happen,” Jacobson said.

The distinction between victims is an important element not only for the way their cases were handled but also for the way the murders occurred and the motivations behind them, per Smith. “When Andrew’s life fell apart, he murdered his closest friend and his lover, but those murders are different from Lee Miglin and Gianni Versace,” he said. “Once he crossed the line and became a killer, he began to kill to pursue ideas.”

Those ideas, according to Murphy, included targeting people “specifically to shame them and out them and have a form of payback for a life that he felt he could not live.” And Smith was adamant about calling Cunanan a “spree killer” whose pathology more closely mirrored terrorism than that of a “serial killer.”

“This is someone who had a [great] education and was brilliant and was witty and had the world at his feet. Why does this person end up killing five people? You have to explore the intellect. You have to explore what went wrong,” Smith said, noting that Cunanan was a man who felt invisible who was desperate to find a way to be seen.

“Once he realizes he lost everything, either you build something that impresses someone which takes a lot of work, or if you don’t want anonymity, you can try to rip something down,” Smith continued. “Andrew ripped down the success of Lee Miglin and Versace.”

Orth, as well, felt Cunanan’s desperation was what drove him — and ultimately what doomed him. “He was willing to kill to become famous. Now you can be an Instagram star or a YouTube star. If he had been born later, maybe that’s what he would have gone for, but he wanted to be famous that he was willing to kill for it,” Orth said.

“The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story” premieres Jan. 17 at 10pm on FX.

‘Assassination of Gianni Versace’ Team on Exploring ‘What Went Wrong’ That Made Andrew Cunanan Kill

‘The Assassination of Gianni Versace’: 6 Things We Learned From FX’s First Screening

Darren Criss has taken on a “Shakespearean” role in bringing the tortured life story of serial killer Andrew Cunanan to life in FX’s “The Assassination of Gianni Versace.”

So said “Versace” director and executive producer Ryan Murphy on Monday night as he “played Barbara Walters” during a Q&A with stars and producers following the series’ first public screening, held at New York City’s Metrograph theater.

“Versace” stars Criss, Edgar Ramirez, Ricky Martin, writer Tom Rob Smith, author Maureen Orth, and executive producers Nina Jacobson and Brad Simpson offered insights into the limited series, which has the hard task of following “The People V. O.J. Simpson” as the second installment of FX’s “American Crime Story” franchise.

Here are 6 things we learned from the first look at “Versace”:

  • Like “People V. O.J. Simpson,” “Versace” takes on larger cultural and societal issues beyond the sensational details of how Cunanan gunned down fashion superstar Versace on the steps of his Miami Beach villa on July 15, 1997. Through the once-and-future prism of a period drama, the first episode raises timely questions about discrimination against LGBT crime victims by law enforcement, disparity in health care for rich and poor, and the sick market for cashing in on grisly celebrity deaths. Versace was one of the first major public figures to live his life openly as a gay man, and, based on the first episode, the then-and-now perspective on cultural attitudes toward the LGBT community is clearly a major theme. “We want every season of this show to be about that crime that America is guilty of,” Jacobson said. “We wanted to re-conjure what it meant to be gay in the 1990s.”
  • Don’t expect a simple linear storyline in “Versace’s” nine episodes. “We’re telling the story backwards. The first and second episodes are about the assassination [of Versace] and the manhunt, and then we go back in time. In episode eight you meet Andrew Cunanan as a child. The final episode deals with his eventual demise,” Murphy said.
  • Orth, author of the 1999 book “Vulgar Favors: The Assassination of Gianni Versace,” said Cunanan’s obsession with achieving a measure of celebrity was a product of the modern age. He was “besotted” with the idea of fame. “He was willing to kill for fame. He wanted to be everything Versace was, but he wasn’t willing to work for it,” Orth said. She added a harsh observation about the nation’s current political climate: “The idea that he was willing to kill for fame — there’s a line from there to getting famous from a sex tape like the Kardashians down to becoming president of the United States because you’re a reality TV star,” Orth opined.
  • Criss became emotionally invested in playing the disturbed serial killer. The role is without question a career-accelerator for the former “Glee” star. Murphy noted that Criss is in every episode, as the story drills down on the factors that made Cunanan kill five people including Versace during his 1997 spree. “Stories that bend people’s sense of empathy are what interest me,” Criss said. “We’re trying to humanize somebody who is so conventionally vilified.” Murphy added: “We’re not interested in the killer-of-the-week approach,” he said. “We’re trying to understand the psychology of someone who would be driven to do those deeds.”
  • Ramirez also got under the skin of Versace, even though his character spends most of episode one on a gurney in the morgue. Recreating the scenes of Versace’s murder on the actual site of his villa in Miami was a challenging process, said Martin, who plays Versace’s longtime lover, Antonio. “It was a profound, moving experience,” Martin said. “The crew was crying, the actors were crying — it was very intense.” Ramirez felt he channeled the soul of his character during his big death scene. He believed Versace lived through the trauma of being taken to the emergency room before he was declared dead at 9:21 a.m. “He was there,” Ramirez said. “He wanted to express something, but he couldn’t, about the insanity and the tragedy that [his murder] could have been prevented and it wasn’t.”
  • Criss also emphasized the importance of the production having access to the Versace villa. “That house — it bleeds his soul,” Criss said. “His creativity exits in every wall and every doorknob in the house. It’s a living vestige of his legacy. I did feel his presence. I had to say a prayer for thanks and an apology for us exposing it. I’m hoping some light can be made from this very, very dark thing.”

‘The Assassination of Gianni Versace’: 6 Things We Learned From FX’s First Screening