Crass, titillating and (at best) casual with the truth, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story takes an instance of real-life cruelty and violence and twists it into oversexed entertainment. It implies an incestuous connection between the two brothers whose story it dramatises under the prurient guise of righting past tabloid wrongs. It has been the most-streamed show on TV since its release in September. And as much as it traduces its subjects, it could also be the best thing to have happened to the Menendez brothers in decades.
The strange thing about Monsters’ exaggerations is that, even in its barest facts, the Menendez brothers’ case could hardly have been more operatic. In August 1989, Lyle (then aged 21) and Erik (18) executed their parents José and Kitty in their own living room in Beverly Hills, using shotguns at point-blank range. Everything about the murders — the glamorous location, the extreme wealth of the Menendez family, the initial suggestion that this was a mafia hit — made the boys’ story immediately irresistible.
Sensationally, the two brothers were arrested after Erik confessed to his therapist, who taped their sessions. The killing was assumed to be motivated by the brothers’ expectation of an inheritance, which they set about spending extravagantly and with little sense of a decent interval. Two spoiled little Patrick Batemans, on a bloodstained spree of hotel suites and Rolexes.
And then, even more sensationally: the brothers’ defence was that they themselves had been the victims of their parents. That the perfectionist José had tyrannised his sons, emotionally, physically and sexually; and that the downtrodden Kitty had silently conspired to protect her husband. Erik and Lyle had killed their parents, it was argued, because they believed their parents were planning to kill them in order to protect the family from shameful revelations.
One reason the case held such allure was that it landed on a faultline in public understanding of trauma, and was one of the first high-profile cases in which long-term abuse was advanced to claim the murder had been a form of self-defence. Dr Ann Burgess, a former FBI profiler who acted as an expert witness for the defence, testified that Erik’s brain had been “rewired” by the molestation he suffered; the prosecution accused her of emitting “psycho-babble”. Another reason is that reactions to the brothers split down gender lines, including in the jury room: Erik’s first trial ended in a hung jury, with female members opting for manslaughter while their male counterparts pushed for murder.
Dominick Dunne, who reported the case for Vanity Fair, claimed scathingly that the women on the jury “fell for [the brothers’] pretty faces, their crocodile tears, and their extravagant lies”. He did not believe the defence — although this wasn’t because he was in denial about the prevalence of child abuse, but rather because he knew brutality first-hand from his own father. “I have had welts on my legs and thighs. To this day I remain partially deaf from a blow to the ear when I was in the fifth grade. I was a sissy. I was not good at sports. I embarrassed my father,” wrote Dunne in one article. He might have recognised himself in the account of the family Burgess gave on the stand. He might not have enjoyed the parallel.
Like the Jeffery Dahmer story, which I found largely unwatchable, these sordid “torn from the headlines” sorts of things are about as inversely worthwhile as they are salacious.
Abusing one’s children is monstrous, as is murdering one’s own parents. No thanks. Adapting tales like these into real life fan fiction isn’t quite as monstrous, but it’s certainly voyeuristic, and trashy. Nothing I’d like to see.
I think I’ll watch the new “Ripley” series instead. The delightfully creepy guy who played Moriarty in Sherlock Holmes, as well as a slimy bureaucrat in “Skyfall,” is far more enjoyable as Highsmith’s Tom Ripley, than a “real life” portrayal of (allegedly) vicious brats and (allegedly) depraved parents.
Highsmith’s characters were always a bit unsettling and a bit uncomfortable, perhaps reflecting Highsmith’s discomfort with her own sexuality. But none of her fiction is as repellent as these tabloid tales of murder and perversion.
the last and strangest abuse in the guise of care to be heaped onto Lyle and Erik Menendez.
Right. Let’s assume they had suffered the abuse and everything that went with it, what would explain so many women wanting to watch a show using that abuse as a subject for entertainment? What exactly are they getting out of it?
I think we need to look at women as being similar to men, in that some are aroused by the act without context. Some are aroused simply by the thought of two good looking young men getting it on. Some are just so desperate for the attention of “their crush” they will offer anything, including their own babies! (Fan girls of Lost Prophet singer). Sometimes it’s because their own upbringing has normalised this behaviour, which is very sad, however while it’s a reason, it’s not an excuse!
Messed up people exist in all walks of life, gender is irrelevant, although I do concede that women tend to be suckers for a sob story more often than men.
Also, I recall someone saying “women don’t watch porn, but they certainly read it”, today they don’t need to read it, as erotica is all over the telly!
Your comment seems to hover over aspects of sex, but that was not what I was getting at so much as the suffering of all concerned and that tragedy being hoovered up as entertainment largely consumed by women. As the quote I mentioned said; the last and strangest abuse in the guise of care to be heaped onto Lyle and Erik Menendez.
Just one more abuse to be heaped on top of their already tragic lives,
I figured as Dittum had already covered the lure of true crime, you were asking about why women were wanting to watch something that covered sexual abuse, I pointed out that in many cases, the context will have been ignored in favour of the visual stimulation. At no point were the brothers seen to be abused as children but as young men, which is easier to ignore the context of abuse. Many women watched purely for the understanding/psychological point of view.
If the abuse defence was fabricated by the brothers, then the tragedy of their lives was self inflicted.
Many women watched purely for the understanding/psychological point of view.
Thats possible, but still leaves open the question of why: curiosity, fear of the world at large, some sort of attraction with underlying reasons. I don’t think the article really digs into this. Word numbers and space might be the reason, but it still wasn’t really covered enough to explain it. Maybe no one knows or maybe it’s an area no one wants to go to; just what goes in in a woman’s mind.
The writer has put forward her answer to your question in the article, in some detail.
Maybe you’re choosing not to accept it?
I don’t think that’s the case. She herself said “The lure of true crime — a genre that is, on the whole, fixated with terrible things done to women by men (even in Monsters, Kitty suffers a spectacularly gruesome end) — is more complicated.”
She suggests both a ‘complicated’ and ‘cynical’ answer. Which to me suggests she isn’t sure. And why should she be, it’s not her area of speciality. Even if there was a definite answer there’s no reason why I should have to accept it. So for me the issue of true crime appealing to women still remains open.
Is it me or does one of the fellas bear a striking resemblance to Freddy?
It’s an interesting take, but Ms Dittum seems to willfully ignore the laid-on-with-a-trowel homoeroticism of the enterprise, which is common to almost all Ryan Murphy’s work. Interesting if it appeals to women as well, but to me the fetishistic portrayal of the brothers (and many of the pretty boy supporting players) is very much a gay aesthetic. It’s so uniform and excessive as to be quite unsettling.
Interestingly, Rivals – although fictional – is another highly sexualised series enjoying massive popularity with women. But there, the objectification – if such it is – covers a far wider breadth of body types and “interesting” faces of both sexes. It’s also a much better show, IMO.
The sexual abuse aspects are so gross as to not be credible.
Do you perhaps not go out much?