‘Monsters’ Star Cooper Koch Broke Down After Seeing His 33-Minute, One-Take Episode for the First Time
When Cooper Koch and Nicholas Chavez signed on to be the stars of Ryan Murphy's " Monsters : The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story" — about the highly publicized parricide case that briefly captured the country's attention in the early 1990s — they were aware there would likely be backlash. And sure enough, in the past week, the internet has been abuzz with critiques of the show, from journalists to Erik Menendez and the Menendez family calling out the series' homoerotic portrayal of unsubstantiated fraternal incest and its moves to cast doubt on the brothers' decades-old claim that years of ritualistic sexual abuse was what led them to murder their parents.
"It's a bit affirming, actually, that it's been received in so many different ways — that it has been as controversial as the case itself," Chavez, who plays Lyle Menendez in the series, told IndieWire. "When this happened, there was a hung jury; there were 50 percent of people who believed one thing and 50 percent of people who believed another thing. The fact that the audience's reception of this project pretty closely mimics that tells me the story was told in a way that incited a lot of the same discussion."
Addressing the many artistic liberties the series takes in its portrayal of the Menendez brothers' story, Chavez said, "I had to do a tremendous amount of research to justify the choices that were being made in this project, since Lyle is written to be, I'd say, the less sympathetic of the two brothers. [...] He behaves erratically and impulsively throughout the series. But it was clear to me that this behavior stemmed from a place of [having] a deeply, deeply wounded inner child, who was first and foremost his father's son and wanted to make him proud more than anything else in the world."
While Chavez may have been focused on highlighting his character's pain when possible, Season 2 of "Monsters" is neither a straightforward study of sexual abuse nor a realistic true-crime story. It's much more in the vein of the contentious, Jeffrey Dahmer-focused first season of the series , with Murphy's penchant for twisted, stylized spectacles showing up in a combination of '80s pop hits, Beverly Hills aesthetics, titillating moments between the brothers and, most of all, the introduction of new story angles at every turn.
Over the nine episodes, the show replays moments from the night of the murder from varying perspectives — including that of Dominick Dunne (Nathan Lane), a Vanity Fair writer who was particularly venomous in his coverage of the Menendez brothers' first trial — and imagined scenes from the surrounding years that posit questions about not just their motives but also their sanity. The persistently unreliable narrative aims to challenge the audience to decide whether the brothers are sociopaths or broken humans pushed to the brink by the cruelty of their parents, José and Kitty Menedez (Javier Bardem and Chloë Sevigny). And key to it all is the series' relatively unknown stars, who seem to have been handed the momentous task of executing Murphy and the other creatives' collective vision while casting their characters in a sympathetic light.
"We had a lot of conversations with our directors about what perspective we were in at a given moment or in a given scene," Koch, who plays Erik Menendez, said, explaining that executing the complicated, multiperspective structure of the series required frequent conversations between the actors and the people behind the camera. "I think I always really tried to stick with my same perspective on Erik, even though I was in somebody else's point of view. I really wanted to always be careful with how I was dealing with Erik's truth; even in other people's perspectives, I wanted to really ride home with that."
When asked to explain how he approached the material scene by scene, Koch talked about using Episode 5, "The Hurt Man" — when Erik tells his lawyer (Ari Graynor) in detail about the degrees of abuse inflicted on him by his father — as a vehicle to drive home the realities of what the Menendez brothers had experienced.
"That's a really pivotal moment in the story, because it pulls the audience in and really gathers their sympathy and helps them understand why this person could do something so horrible and so gruesome," Koch said of the disturbing 33-minute, single-take scene . "We did eight takes, so I wasn't sure which one they picked. And in watching it, I felt really happy. I felt really proud. I broke down after it was over, when it ended. I was with my partner, and he held me and was so kind and supportive, and he loved it as well."
"And actually, a lot of what's written in Episode 5 is taken directly from Erik's testimony. All of the details of the abuse are accurate — and they're true," he said.
"They're his own words, or a lot of it is, so it was really just watching that testimony and the trial footage and understanding his body language," he said about preparing for the scene. "His shoulders are very closed off; he's quiet; he has a lot of tension in his mouth. He purses his lips; he does this thing where he sighs a lot. I wanted to capture all of those [things] to further support the claim that he was, in fact, sexually abused."
Despite saying that his performance was "led, in many ways, by the script," Chavez seems to have been infected with the same need to capture the truth, as he understood it, of his character. He said the most pivotal moment of his portrayal was when Lyle takes the stand in Episode 7, "Showtime," to testify about the abuse inflicted upon him by his father — and the abuse, he reveals to the courtroom, he inflicted on his brother.
"On his first day on set, Javier said something to the effect of, he believes that when you play a real person, a portal opens up between you and that person that you're playing. And throughout the entirety of filming this project, I was never able to shake that visual out of my head," Chavez said, before explaining how he prepared for the episode by studying the trial footage that inspired the scene.
"When I saw Lyle's testimony on the stand, I was awestruck," he said. "I think I had a similar view as Dominick Dunne [in the show] when he remarks about Lyle that there's just no way he's not telling the truth. And I wanted to get across the fact that for the first time, maybe in his entire life, he's sharing the truth with the world. I wanted to as closely mirror the actual footage as possible without creating a replica; I wanted to try to live through that circumstance in a way that I felt Lyle lived through it."
Both of the 20-something actors' efforts to bring depth to the material — which have been extolled by their seasoned costars, including Bardem and Sevigny — are apparent on screen. Though, that doesn't mean the final product always feels as weighty as perhaps it should.
Whether intentional or not, "Monsters" often strays into the absurd, like in moments when Lyle, behind bars, frantically tries to care for his toupee and repeatedly screams into the jail's phone about needing more dimes. Sometimes, it even seems that the cast members are in different productions altogether, with Sevigny and Bardem giving a mostly straightforward portrayal of the allegedly abusive parents, Lane often veering into melodrama, and Dallas Roberts and Leslie Grossman — who plays the self-serving therapist who recorded the brothers' confession in session and his erratic mistress — going the comedic route. Plus, the pop ballads like "Blame It on the Rain."
For Koch, who fields questions about the series with an impressive amount of ease, the outrageous or laughable moments in "Monsters" bring a much-needed levity that prevents it from being so serious that it's unwatchable.
"I think it helps with balancing the depth of the darkness in the show," Koch said. "This story is so tragic, if you don't have those other colors to balance it out, it's going to be very difficult to watch. And this is a TV show. We're ultimately making a TV show."
Unlike Murphy, who despite often inviting controversy is quick to balk at it when it arrives , Koch seems content with acknowledging the imperfect nature of what they ended up doing, as well as accepting criticism from the many people who take offense to it, especially the ones personally affected by the 1989 murder.
"I understand from the family's point of view and from Erik's point of view that it's really difficult to see this story portrayed in a fictionalized, dramatized, Hollywood TV way. These people are still in prison. They're still alive, and their family all supports them and wants them to be released. So things like this could very well make a difference in that situation," Koch said, noting he hopes the series could make a positive difference.
"Do I think it's fair, though?" he said, referring to objections to the show's often inaccurate portrayal of events . "I think when you make art, you give it to the world and people are going to hate it, people are going to love it, people are going to like it a little bit and not like it a little. If people like it, great. If people don't like it, great. I got what I needed to get out of it."
