Netflix's Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, premiered back in September. The true-crime anthology series from Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan chronicles the case of real-life brothers, who were convicted in 1996 for the murders of their parents, José and Mary Louise “Kitty” Menendez.
While the prosecution argued they were seeking to inherit their family fortune, the brothers claimed that their actions stemmed out of fear from a lifetime of physical, emotional and sexual abuse. They hold those beliefs to this day, as they serve life sentences without the possibility of parole.
Peggy Tachdijan (pictured) served as editor on two of the series' nine episodes, all of which were cut using Avid Media Composer.
"I was brought in as a producing editor...which means that I worked closely with our EPs Ryan Murphy & Alexis Martin Woodall, as well as our producing director Carl Franklin to shape Episode 1 and set the tone and style for the season," she explains.
Because the show is about real people and real events, the goal was to make sure the details were as accurate as possible.
“One thing we talked about early on was that the murder scene needed to be as horrific as the crime scene photos,” she recalls. “The brothers in real life, and as portrayed by our amazing actors Nicholas Alexander Chavez and Cooper Koch, are pretty charming, and we didn’t want viewers to care about them too much. It was important that people understood how brutal the murder of their parents actually was. Carl rehearsed with the actors until it was almost a choreographed dance they were performing on the day of the shoot, so by the time the footage got to me, there was such a variety of takes to pick from, shot at different speeds and from different angles, that it wasn’t so much about pulling my favorites but more which ones were going to make the murder feel the most visceral.”
The scene was shot without any practical special effects - squibs, blood, etc. - because the production wanted to be able to do multiple takes without too many breaks.
“All the blood and bullet wounds were VFX that were added in post,” reveals Tachdijan. “This way we were able to pour over crime scene photos and make sure that the wounds were as accurate as possible. There were small details in that scene that I hadn’t been aware of before reading the scripts, like the fact that halfway through, they went out to reload their guns so they could ‘finish off mom.’ That was chilling to read, and Chloe Sevigny's performance in that moment still haunts me.”
Tachdijan also worked closely with the show’s composers - the father/daughter team of Thomas and Julia Newman - to find the right sound for the music.
“They wrote an incredibly intense piece leading up to the boys entering the house, but we felt that it was really important to drop out of the music and to go very quiet for when they are inside, so you can feel the stillness and the dread of the impending horror. As hard as it was to edit, I am very proud of the collaboration that went into making that scene so incredibly intense to watch.”