Ryan Murphy has defended his work from criticism from some family members of the victims of Jeffrey Dahmer, claiming that ‘not a single’ one of them responded to the production team's requests for input. Check out the trailer for Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story below.
So, before get into it we should think about the fact that this was a dramatisation of probably the most unsettling and difficult periods of these people’s lives.
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They can be forgiven for not wanting that played out on the screen for the enjoyment of true crime fans.
Still, Ryan Murphy and his team behind the hugely-popular Netflix show say they did try to make contact with the families but never heard anything back from them.
One of the most vocal critics has been Rita Isbell, whose brother Errol Lindsey was killed by Dahmer, who accused the team of ‘making money off this tragedy’.
To be fair, it’s a compelling story, but that’s also a compelling argument.
The mother of victim Tony Hughes said: "I don't see how they can use our names and put stuff out like that out there"
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She also claimed that ‘it didn’t happen like that’.
Anyway, Murphy has now addressed the criticism, telling The Hollywood Reporter that they did reach out during their research for the show, in which Evan Peters plays the titular murderer.
"It's something that we researched for a very long time,” he said.
"And we, over the course of the three, three and a half years when we were really writing it, working on it, we reached out to 20, around 20 of the victims' families and friends trying to get input, trying to talk to people and not a single person responded to us in that process.
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"So we relied very, very heavily on our incredible group of researchers who ... I don't even know how they found a lot of this stuff.
"But it was just like a night and day effort to us trying to uncover the truth of these people."
In the end, Murphy said that the show was aimed at showing not who Dahmer was as a man, but ‘the monster that he became’.
He also made mention of how Dahmer managed to evade detection through a cloak of protection offered by systematic racism, homophobia, and white privilege.
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The creator also offered to set up a memorial for the victims, questioning why there isn’t a permanent memorial already.
"Anything that we could do to get that to happen ... I would even be happy to pay for it myself,” he continued.
"I do think there should be something.
“And we're trying to get a hold of people to talk about that.
“I think there's some resistance because they think the park would attract people who are interested in paying homage to the macabre… but I think something should be done."
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If you’re keen, Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is available to stream on Netflix now.
Topics: TV and Film, Netflix, Crime, True Crime
Tom Wood