Television producing dynamo and svengali of queer content Ryan Murphy has just announced his newest project: a biopic series of gay serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer.
Deadline reports that Murphy will produce the new show for Netflix along with longtime collaborator Ian Brennan. Janet Mock and Carl Franklin will also direct the show, with Mock also set to write episodes as well.
Jeffrey Dahmer became a household name after the revelation that he had seduced, murdered, and eaten at least 17 men during the 1980s and 90s in the American midwest. His story took an even more scandalous turn when it was revealed law enforcement could have stopped and apprehended his killing spree on at least 10 occasions, though Dahmer’s status as a young, white man often allowed him to escape detection. Attitudes about the LGBTQ community within law enforcement also played a role. Courts eventually convicted Dahmer of 16 murders. He himself was murdered in prison in 1994 at age 34.
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The new show, tentatively titled Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, will chronicle Dahmer’s killing spree, his ability to evade police and the live stories of his victims. The show will also detail Dahmer’s troubled, religious upbringing, with Oscar-nominee Richard Jenkins (The Shape of Water) set to play Dahmer’s father.
Currently, the creative team has launched a nationwide search for the actor to play Dahmer himself. Numerous biopics and horror films have portrayed the killer over the years, featuring actors including Jeremy Renner and Ross Lynch as the killer.
Monster marks the latest in a series of collaborations between Murphy and Netflix, following Hollywood, The Boys in the Band, The Politician and Ratched, all released earlier this year. No release date for the new series has been announced.
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Max
he’s certainly giving Netflix their money’s worth.
wooly101
This is great. I hope it’s nice and gritty.
Daggerman
….what the hell…why is a sick piece of s**t like Dahmer getting so much coverage for?
dhmonarch89
Nation wide search….Murphy’s bed is THAT big?
Joshooeerr
Hasn’t Dahmer already been, if you’ll excuse the expression, done to death. Worse, Murphy has an established reputation for fetishising, even glorifying, serial killers. I say “ick.”
missvamp
love it! bring on the gore!
nm4047
was the Versace production not enough, not sure there is sufficient knowledge of this killer and unfortunately Murphy has an issue of creative license. Unfortunately this version of the event becomes the event lazy viewer(s) see but not the actual reality of what happens, eg Hollywood have heard several young gays after watch that fantasy, telling (not asking) about how great Hollywood was for gays in the 50-60’s, take quite a bit of convincing that is a drama based on a time not based on actual events.
MarkyMarkNipple
He does do a bit better with established source material. But unlike the “best in show’ and other movies in the group, ensemble cast. The murphy cast is played out. It’s hard to tell if it’s bad acting or camp.
Derek Northcutt
It’s a shame that “Glee” exhausted his creativity and now everything he does is so woefully derivative.
inbama
Trashy.
controversial2019
Murphy already had the character of Dahmer in American Horror Story: Hotel – so I find it odd that he’s now going to focus on him for his own series. Also surprised, given how Murphy tends to stick with casts he’s worked with before, that he’s not having the actor who played Dahmer in AHS play him in the new series.
JessPH
Ugh. Not another serial killer series. Doesn’t Netflix already have enough of those? I’m more interested in the Clinton sex scandal mini series he is reportedly making. When will that be shown?