The story of the Menéndez brothers, convicted in 1996 of murdering their parents José and Mary Louise “Kitty” Menéndez, will next be tackled by Ryan Murphy as part of his Netflix franchise “Monster.” Netflix and Murphy were set to confirm Monday that they are at work on “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” the follow-up to the hit limited series “Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.”
Netflix had ordered two additional installments of the anthology series from Murphy and Ian Brennan; this would rep the first. Separately, Netflix revealed that it also has what it called “exclusive access” to Lyle and Erik Menéndez to participate in a documentary feature from Campfire Studios.
The announcement of “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story” comes as the case of the Menéndez brothers recently returned to the news headlines. The new Peacock docuseries “Menendez + Menudo: Boys Betrayed” focuses on an allegation by Roy Rosselló, a former member of the Puerto Rican boy band Menudo, who says that he was sexually assaulted as a teenager by Jose Menéndez.
It’s unclear whether those new allegations would be addressed in “Monsters,” but in their trial, famed defense attorney Leslie Abramson argued that Lyle and Erik murdered their parents out of fear after years of sexual molestation by their music executive father.
The story of the Menéndez brothers has been the focus of several docs and scripted projects over the years, including two most recently in 2017: The NBC series “Law & Order: True Crime — The Menéndez Murders,” starring Edie Falso as Abramson (which earned her an Emmy nom), and Lifetime’s TV movie “Menendez: Blood Brothers,” starring Courtney Love as Abramson.
This also isn’t the first time Murphy and Brennan have addressed the Menéndez brothers in some form; they were mentioned in FX’s “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story,” which took place at the same time as the Menéndez trials.
‘Dahmer’ was a tremendous success for Netflix, which reported that the show reached “1 billion view hours in its first 60 days, making it only one of four series to achieve this milestone.”
‘Dahmer’ is considered a top contender in this year’s Primetime Emmys competition in limited/anthology series. Already, Niecy Nash-Betts won the Critics Choice Award for best supporting actress in a limited series and the NAACP Image Award for outstanding actress in a limited series, while Evan Peters won the Golden Globe for best performance by an actor in a limited series.
Here’s the announcement video for “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.”