WHEN THEY SEE US MEET THE ‘CENTRAL PARK JOGGER’
BEHIND-THE-SCENES SECRETS OF THE HARROWING TRUE-CRIME SERIES
Few true-crime series have resonated like Ava Duvernay’s moving new drama When They See Us. Based on the real-life story of the Central Park Five, When They See Us follows the wrongful convictions and incarceration of five black and Latino teenagers over the brutal rape of Trisha Meili in 1989.
The quintet of innocent teens – Kevin Richardson, 14, Raymond Santana, 14, Antron Mccray, 15, Yusef Salaam, 14, and 16-year-old Korey Wise – spent 13 years fighting the convictions from 1989 to their eventual exoneration in 2002.
The five teenagers were falsely imprisoned following
coerced confessions and spent between six and 13 years behind bars.
Ultimately, the real perpetrator was found to be serial rapist Matias Reyes. The real-life men, all now aged in their 40s, were closely involved with the production of criticallyacclaimed Netflix show – all except victim Trisha Meili. Until 2003, Trisha remained anonymous and was known as the ‘Central Park Jogger’ for nearly 25 years.
Trisha was 28 when she was attacked and raped during a night-time jog on April 19, 1989. She was in a coma for 12 days and woke with zero memory of her attack.
Rising star Alexandra Templer played the tormented character of Trisha in When They See Us, landing the role fresh out of graduate school at NYU.
As the Georgia-born actress exclusively tells New Idea, it was a tough gig playing the real-life survivor.
“It was a bit tricky because there’s no source material for Trisha Meili at that time because she was anonymous in the press for so long, so all I had was the written court documents and a court sketch with the face blurred,” Alexandra says.
“I didn’t meet her. It was never really presented to me as an option to do so in the same way that the men were very present on the series, but I tried to get to know her as best I could.”
“I quite love playing characters that are based on real people because it requires more of me as an actor, an artist and a person. It requires your mind and your body in different way that I find really rigorous and kind of delicious.”
While Alexandra never met Trisha – who has remained private since publishing her memoir I Am the Central Park Jogger in 2003 – she and the cast spent a lot of time with the Central Park Five.
Korey, Kevin, Raymond, Antron and Yusef were at filming from the very first table read all the way to the wrap party.
“I was quite nervous to meet them because even though I was playing a character, I felt weirdly shy about being present in the room. And Ava took me over to them and was like ‘Guess who she’s playing!’ And I was like, ‘Oh no Ava, please no!’,” Alexandra laughs.
“And then she was like, ‘She’s playing the jogger!’ and then they just gave me this really big hug … I was shaking a little bit. It was a really amazing moment.”
Like most of the world, Alexandra didn’t know the nightmarish details behind the false confessions and eventual wrongful convictions.
“The events of that night, the police investigation and the prosecution all happened before I was born, I learned about the case as a teenager and from my parents, who are both lawyers,” she says.
“It is a really fantastically told story with so much sensitivity on Ava’s part. It resonates because of how relevant it is 30 years later – we still have mass incarceration in this country. We still have a pretty broken criminal justice system and we have deeply entrenched systems of racism.”
Despite this, Alexandra hopes Trisha’s story of survival is not lost in the Netflix re-telling.
“She suffered a brain injury which impaired her memory of the event, and I think she’s as much of a victim as anyone else. Her story is one of a remarkable recovery.”
In a rare interview with Oprah in 2002, Trisha spoke about her attack.
“I still have some balance issues. And my vision is impaired and I’ve lost my sense of smell,” Trisha admitted.
“I’m more than the Central Park Jogger – that’s just a name. But I understand that’s how people know me, and that’s OK with me.”