TV review
shamelessly jack a format, keeping up the quality is the least you can do.
We open on the shotgun blast murders and the actual 911 call, a chilling set-up that, in its grainy footage and the way it drops right into the action, nods more to SVU than what’s to come.
Despite some ropy lines — “guns, pills and money: what could go wrong?” — for the most part it’s a taut and tense thriller. The suspects are Eric, the younger brother and an aspiring tennis pro, and Lyle, a student at Yale. Each is young, entitled and handsome; each has also suffered under a harsh and domineering father.
There are mob dealings, evidence of an anxiety-ridden and pill-popping mother, the generalised era-specific racist moral panic around “gang bangers” — but the boys scream increasingly loudly as the perpetrators.
The creators chose the case well: the Menendez murders were amongst a string of lurid crimes which gripped America and thus the world in the 90s — including Tonya Harding’s assault of Nancy Kerrigan, the JonBenet Ramsey case and that of OJ Simpson.
All have been subject to recent dramas, documentaries or, least successfully, combinations of the two. But the specifics of the Menendez case — the money, the family dynamic, the trials, the strange characters who clustered around them — add up to a richer seam of source material than most.
Eric and Lyle already had a cinematic quality to begin with. Young, handsome, complex and gifted, they also seemed impatient for what they felt was coming to them. Their father was ferocious and controlling, and thus the baubles of wealth were all around, yet not quite within their grasp.
Straight after their parents’ death they splurge on Rolexes and Armani suits, days later there are Porsches and dreams of business empire. While there is no textbook way to grieve, Lyle seemed to barely acknowledge the deaths, while Eric is consumed by his conscience.
It’s a classic example of money run amok, the excesses of the American judicial system, pampered kids and seemingly perfect parents concealing a lot. And despite coming from that factory of lurid crime and punishment, it’s handled with restraint by the Law & Order team.
In fact, while coming very deep into its run, this might well be the most impressive feat in the series’ long history, and shows that despite its ubiquity, the true crime well is far from dry.