Ryan Murphy set to be even more insufferable as Menendez brothers get new evidence hearing

Murphy hasn't taken credit for the Menendez brothers getting a new hearing to consider evidence that might impact their sentencing… yet

By William Hughes | October 4, 2024 | 12:58am

Photo: Ted Soqui/Sygma via Getty Images

TV News Monsters: The Erik And Lyle Menendez Story

Ryan Murphy set to be even more insufferable as Menendez brothers get new evidence hearing

In news that could, depending on how things shake out, transform Ryan Murphy even further into the most irritatingly self-satisfied man in the entire world, Variety reports that Erik and Lyle Menendez have been granted a new hearing to examine evidence relating to their murder convictions—nearly 30 years after being convicted of the killing of their parents, but a scant two weeks after the release of Murphy’s new TV show about them, Monsters. Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascón made a statement this week that new evidence has been brought forward suggesting that both Erik and Lyle Menendez may have been molested by their father, José—which both brothers have long alleged, and which the Murphy show acknowledges—and that said evidence needs to be considered in light of their current sentences of life without parole.

Of course, the truth of the timing of all this is that it’s much more likely that Murphy (who recently asserted that his show was “the best thing that’s happened to the Menendez brothers in 30 years”) simply did the Ryan Murphy thing here and managed to glom on to a rising trend that was already picking up steam. There’s been increased interest in the Menendez case in recent years; specifically, it sounds like some of the evidence being considered here—which includes, according to Gascón, allegations that RCA Records head José Menendez molested one of the members of the band Menudo—is of a piece with material covered in last year’s Peacock documentary Menendez + Menudo. None of which, we imagine, will stop Murphy from at least lightly taking credit if, as Gascón floated in his statement, the new evidence leads to a potential re-examination of the brothers’ sentences.

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The Menendez family has pretty widely condemned Monsters, not least of which because of the incestuous overlay the show applies to the brothers’ relationship. (Murphy says he was just trying to fulfill an “obligation for storytellers” and represent the many rumors and theories floating around the crime. This has not made the family less mad.) Netflix actually has another Menendez project out this week, a documentary that both Lyle and Erik gave interviews for, so welcome to 2024: The Year Of The Menendez Brothers (Again).