Infamous bachelor, his violent history revisited in movie
TV REVIEW /
LOS ANGELES — The fun part of “The Dating Game” was this: The person trying to blindly select a potential date — from three people who could be heard but not seen — never knew who was going to come around the corner.
The person could be great-looking, a dud or somewhere in the middle.
On an episode of the game show in 1978, Cheryl Bradshaw, the woman doing the picking, made a frightening choice: Rodney Alcala.
She didn’t know who he was at the time but later learned that he was America’s most prolific serial killer.
A re-creation of that moment is part of the made-for-cable film “The Dating Game Killer,” to be shown Sunday on Investigation Discovery.
Guillermo Diaz (“Scandal”) takes on the role of Alcala; Carrie Preston (“The Good Wife”) plays Carol Jensen, a mother who tirelessly seeks justice for her murdered daughter.
Preston’s character is based on a blend of several women who lost children to the serial killer.
Diaz took on the disturbing role of a man with a near-genius IQ who preyed on young, attractive women, luring them by claiming to be a professional photographer who wanted to enter their photos in a contest.
Although the precise victim count remains unknown, Alcala is thought to have killed as many as 130 women and children before his capture in 1980.
Portraying Alcala is the latest in a long line of TV and film roles for Diaz that include “Mercy,” “Weeds” and “Girls.” The serialkiller role stands out from all the others.
“Luckily enough, once we started shooting, all of that went away because I could just concentrate on the work,” Diaz said. “Making the movie was kind of cathartic for me because I was able to get out all of those feelings I was having before we started.”
Complicating the role was Alacala’s apparent charm. Many who knew him, despite the heinous things he did, described him as highly charming. (Yet Bradshaw, the contestant on “The Dating Game,” ultimately refused to go out with Alcala.)
Diaz had to play the character in a way that would allow viewers to understand the insanity of his evil and his ability to lure so many victims to their deaths.
“I tried to sort of focus on the humanity of this guy,” Diaz said. “Sadly, all these victims fell for his charms.”
From the game-show appearance to Alcala’s bizarre courtroom appearance — during which, acting as his own lawyer, he interrogates himself — the story has so many strange elements that it seems too odd to be true.
That’s exactly how it struck Preston when she read the script.
“Sometimes truth is way more terrifying than fiction,” she said. “I also think that’s what makes this story so gripping — the fact he was able to get away with so much before he was finally punished for it in a meaningful way.
“Then when you add in the bizarre element of him being a contestant on a game show as a convicted rapist that they didn’t catch before he went on national TV, it all becomes so interesting.”