The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
‘Dateline NBC’ trying its first multi-part crime drama
After the format worked for HBO and Netflix, “Dateline NBC” is trying its own version of a multi-part true crime drama this month.
The newsmagazine premieres “The Widower,” about a Las Vegas man who had four of his six wives die under mysterious circumstances, on Feb. 18. The story unfurls over three nights and five hours.
It’s one of three steps the network is taking to try and expand the appeal of the newsmagazine’s crime franchise. This month, the Peacock streaming service will debut its own “Dateline NBC” channel, and a second podcast narrated by
correspondent Keith Morrison will premiere.
“We’re trying to go where the viewers are going,” said David Corvo, the show’s senior executive producer, “and you have to do that. We’re not all watching one event at the same time like we did when we grew up.”
“The Widower” is actually 12 years in the making. “Dateline NBC” producer Dan Slepian was embedding with Las Vegas police in 2008 when Thomas Randolph was arrested for murder. He kept following, and filming, the case until there was a recent resolution, said Liz Cole, the show’s executive producer.
HBO’s “The Jinx” and Netflix’s “Making of a Murderer” and several podcasts have illustrated the appeal of immersive
crime stories that go beyond the one- or two-hour format of network newsmagazines.
The risk, however, comes in following a trend and making a story longer than the material merits.
Slepian, who calls Randolph the “Joe Exotica of true crime” and hypes the “The Widower” as “’Tiger King’ meets ‘Jinx’ meets ‘In Cold Blood,’” vouches for its ability to hold the audience’s attention.
“The story itself almost demands all of the time we are giving it because of all of the twists and turns,” he said.
“Dateline” has interesting inside looks at how the police and prosecutors reacted as the story unfolds, and they would likely not make it if the show was tightly edited into one episode, he said.