Ryan Murphy has defended Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story amid backlash to his new Netflix true crime series, addressing the criticism from Erik Menendez himself.
Created by Murphy and Ian Brennan, Season 2 of Monster centers on the notorious case, which resulted in the trial of the century after Erik and Lyle murdered their parents Kitty and Jose Menendez in 1989.
While it’s not a simple case of guilty or innocent, the brothers are now fighting their case from prison, arguing they were subjected to a lifetime of physical, psychological, and sexual abuse at the hands of their parents.
Since landing on the streaming service, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story has faced heavy backlash for how it’s depicted Lyle, how the abuse allegations were handled, and the scenes implying they had an incestuous relationship.
Erik’s wife Tammi Menendez shared a statement on his behalf on X/Twitter responding to the new Netflix series, arguing it created “a caricature of Lyle rooted in horrible and blatant lies rampant in the show.”
“I believe Ryan Murphy cannot be this naive and inaccurate about the facts of our lives so as to do this without bad intent,” he continued.
Erik said it’s “sad” that the portrayal of the case has taken us back to a time “when the prosecution built a narrative on a belief system that males were not sexually abused, and that males experienced rape trauma differently than women.”
In a new interview with Murphy, Entertainment Tonight discussed the Menendez brothers’ disappointment in Monster Season 2, asking, “What do you say to their backlash?”
“I have many things to say about that,” he replied. “I think it’s interesting that he’s issued a statement without having seen the show. It’s really, really hard if it’s your life, to see your life up on screen.”
“The thing that I find interesting, that he doesn’t mention in his quote, is if you watch the show, I would say 60-65% of our show in the scripts and in the film form center around the abuse and what they claim happened to them,” Murphy continued.
“And we do it very carefully and we give them their day in court, and they talk openly about it. In this age where people can really talk about sexual abuse, talking about it and writing about it and writing about all points of view can be controversial.
“It’s a ‘Rashomon’ kind of approach, where there were four people involved in that, two of them are dead. What about the parents? We had an obligation as storytellers to also try and put in their perspective based on our research, which we did.”
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The interviewer followed this up by addressing the backlash to the implications of a romantic relationship between the Menendez brothers.
“If you watch the show, what the show is doing is presenting the points of view and theories from so many people who were involved in the case,” Murphy responded.
Erik's response to the Netflix's series.#NetflixMonsters #Netflix #RyanMurphy pic.twitter.com/Xz1waxA2u3
— Tammi Menendez (@TammiMenendez1) September 20, 2024
“Dominick Dunne wrote several articles talking about that theory. We are presenting his point of view just as we present Leslie Abramson’s point of view. And we had an obligation to show all of that, and we did.”
Despite his defense, Murphy’s statement hasn’t gone down well with followers of the true crime case. “What they CLAIM happened to them? So dismissive of abuse victims, there is evidence that Jose was abusive,” said one on Reddit.
Another commented, “And what does he have to say about the obvious fetishization of the brothers??? And the wildly inaccurate portrayal of Lyle?? I’m still in awe of how bad the show was. I really didn’t think he was gonna f**k up this bad.”
“‘We had an obligation’. You didn’t, you could have just left the case alone and not made a show about it,” added a third. “He fetishised the brothers and got Lyle completely wrong, if it wasn’t for Cooper’s portrayal of Erik the whole show would have been a complete write off.”
A fourth said, “Dominic Dunne never made incestuous claims, am I going insane? All he did was be creepily obsessed with the brothers’ sexuality… why not add Robert Rand who was interviewed even DEEPER in the case.”
Not everyone is angry with the series, however, including this person who said, “Of course the dialog isn’t perfect and the emotions might not be expressed exactly the same as happened in reality, but it seems to get the point across as far as an objective outside observer.”
A second stated, “From the moment that Kitty ripped off Lyle’s wig in the beginning, I was on the boys’ side. I watched the series with Edie Falco that came out in 2017, and never felt as much sympathy portrayed for them like this show does.”
Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story is streaming on Netflix now. There’s also a new documentary about the case coming to Netflix on October 7. Until then, learn more about the case with our guides to the Monsters’ toupee and where Dr. Jerome Oziel is now.