The Dropout · Terry Kinney, Bet-Crapped
And: Know Your True-Crime Petersons
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A recent mailing from A&E’s True Crime desk reminded me to write up a quick Know Your Lethal Petersons item in case, like me, you more than occasionally find yourself saying things like “no, not him — the owl guy.” Between the fact that all the pertinent Petersons have relatively ordinary first names, and the fact that two of the murdered wives were named Kathleen, one Peterson had a wife named Stacy and another one’s was named Laci, but then the Stacy one has a daughter named Lacy…let’s just boil it down to laminated-card facts real quick before The Staircase comes out, shall we?
Drew Peterson
Which one is he? The former undercover cop and serial philanderer who killed his third wife, Kathleen Savio, and probably killed his fourth wife, Stacy.
What’s his current status? Peterson insists he’s innocent in both those matters, but is serving a life sentence for the murder of Savio; while a judge ruled last month that Peterson could be heard on an “ineffective assistance of counsel” motion (I’m paraphrasing, possibly poorly), he’ll still have to serve an additional forty-year term for trying to arrange a hit on the county attorney who prosecuted him.
Who played him in the TV movie? Remember Rob Lowe’s mini-sideline playing murderous shitbirds in Lifetime movies 10-15 years ago? He rocked a cheesy cop ’stache for 2012’s Drew Peterson: Untouchable. If you’ve got a few bucks, you can board that time machine here.
Michael Peterson
Which one is he? The Staircase guy whose attorneys tried to blame the death of his second wife, Kathleen, on an enraged owl while local prosecutors — including Mike Nifong — leveraged Peterson’s bisexuality as evidence of…something, and also everyone said the word “blowpoke” like a thousand times.
What’s his current status? This Peterson submitted an Alford plea in 2017 to a lesser manslaughter charge, and was sentenced to time served. He’s currently out, and presumably waiting to see how Colin Firth makes him look in the scripted Staircase project. (He also wrote a crimoir in 2019; anyone read it?)
Who played him in the TV movie? Firth, and now that I’m typing this, I see it’s probably time to Bet-Crap ol’ Firthie, but although the case has been covered to hell and gone by various non-fiction outlets, Firth is it so far.
Scott Peterson
Which one is he? The cheaty frosted-tips guy whose pregnant wife Laci disappeared on Christmas Eve, 2002. The remains of Laci and the Petersons’ unborn son surfaced in April of 2003. Scott acted 360 sketchy about his family’s vanishing and death, but insists he didn’t kill them.
What’s his current status? Peterson was convicted and sentenced to death in 2005. Since the case was tried in California, that sentence was unlikely to be carried out, but it was overturned in August of 2020, and Peterson was given a “true” life sentence (no parole) in December of last year. Peterson is still trying to get a new trial based on a claim of juror misconduct.
Who played him in the TV movie? Most famously, Dean “Rique” Cain in 2004’s The Perfect Husband.
2005’s Amber Frey: Witness For The Prosecution saw journeyman Nathan Anderson in the Scott role (and now I also have to Bet-Crap Terry Kinney, I guess?).
So: Drew is the cop, Michael is The Staircase, Scott is the other one. — SDB
…What the hell, let’s just run TK through the BETCRP 3000 now, shall we? But before we begin, 1) refresh your memory on the Bet-Crap parameters if you need to, and 2) enjoy an anecdote about how someone calling themselves “terry kinney” emailed me back in April of 2006 as follows:
wow. you ARE mean.
terry
Zero idea what this referred to (could have been anything; I am pretty damn mean), although I suspect I’d been low-blow snarky in a TWoP Oz recap or something. I did not enjoy the McManus character, at all, but I think I had good things to say about him in The House of Mirth (it was very good casting IMO), and certainly I was glad to see him in Inventing Anna.
But what’s his Best Evidence True-Crime Résumé Percentage overall? To the math!
Murder Ordained (1987), 1 pt (I don’t believe he’s a name figure; I’d never heard of the thing; its nominations weren’t pertinent IMO)
Deadly Matrimony (ska Shattered Promises), (1992), 1 pt (this one is deffo going to come up again in future BETCRPs; every damn one is in it)
J.F.K.: Reckless Youth (1993), 3 pts (when it comes to the Kennedys, “name figure” in the case starts to get a little whiffy, but Kinney plays Joe, who was a bootlegger and is known to us)
Sleepers (1996), 3 pts (this is a judgment call, because the only real “name” is Lorenzo Carcaterra, who wrote the book, but a) Kinney plays a baddie and b) does it memorably)
The Laramie Project (2002), 3 pts (he was nominated for a Satellite Award for playing Dennis Shepard; I can’t quite get there for the “name figure” points, but the property should be a true-crime HOFer)
Amber Frey: WFTP (2005), 1 pt
Show Me A Hero (2015), 1 pt (this may not belong in here, but I’m putting it under an IRL-corruption umbrella)
Extremely Wicked Shockingly Evil and Vile (2019), 1 pt
Inventing Anna (2022), 1 pt (and we can bump it up later if they get a Best Ensemble SAG)
That brings us to 15 points; with 73 roles in the acting section of Kinney’s IMDb c.v., that puts Kinney’s final BETCRP score at 20.5. Much higher than I would have guessed a few hours ago! — SDB
Sometimes a BETCRP ends up behind the paywall. To make sure you don’t miss any of these highly scientific analyses (hee), or any other links and reviews with the little lock symbol on them, grab yourself a subscription today. It’s just $5 a month! — SDB
It’s free to listen to Eve talking with the EHG panel about The Dropout, though! Because one of my feline family members went through the veil that day, I had to skip the record, but Eve, Tara, and Dave ably covered a lot of my thoughts, including whether The Dropout fails to explain why Elizabeth Holmes got people to follow/believe in her, or whether that’s just something that can’t be explained; whether the series tries too hard to make Holmes its protagonist, and ergo sympathetic; and if the Amanda Seyfried casting worked out for the best in the end.
I agree that it did; The Dropout has its flaws, but casting an actor as genuinely likable as Seyfried lets the series do a lot more with the idea that Holmes had her human-frailty reasons for letting the Theranos situation get fraudulently out of control. That doesn’t answer the question of whether Holmes and her actions merit that sort of narrative consideration, but the fact is that, as in many other con stories, we’re never going to get a satisfying “why,” so we’re obliged to focus on the “who,” and the “who” here is fascinating to us, at least in part and whether we like it or not, because we as a culture like to see a nerdy striving lady brought low. The idea that Holmes is a sort of victim herself is not to everyone’s liking here, and I don’t think that’s wrong, but I don’t mind that The Dropout wants us to think about why we found Holmes — or more to the point her downfall — so compelling.
I’ll also note that a big part of the trick for a series like The Dropout is to stay up on a narrative tightrope that lays the case out clearly enough for case newbies to grasp, but not so painstakingly that folks who read Bad Blood get impatient — and gives case-heads more of a 30,000-ft. view of the forces at work. I’ve only seen the first three episodes, but as far as the construction and pacing go, The Dropout strikes that balance well.
We’re eager to hear what you thought, if you’ve started watching,
and just as eager to clear out Theranos Korner in our budget doc, so here’s a little more reading on Holmes and Theranos, including
“Why Amanda Seyfried Originally Turned Down the Chance to Play Elizabeth Holmes” [THR] // It’s actually not anything actor-y. This is a fun read; Seyfried was really thoughtful about the portrayal. (Daniel Fienberg’s review is a lot gentler than the Joe vs. Carole write-up; the series is sitting at 90% on Rotten Tomatoes at this writing.)
“Legal experts agree Elizabeth Holmes is bound for prison, but for how long?” [East Bay Times] // Holmes would probably get the book thrown at her as an example…if she didn’t have a small child, but she does, which may induce the judge to split the difference at her sentencing in September.
“Hollywood Bets Big on the Bad Entrepreneur” [New York Times] // Amanda Hess looks at The Dropout, WeCrashed, and Super Pumped (with a side of Inventing Anna) and talks about the aggregate experience of this subgenre trend:
Watching them together, they create a shared universe in which scamming and entrepreneurship meet in a chaotic portrait of American decline. Sprinkled through the shows are movie stars playing wealthy weirdos, maximalist title cards demystifying financial transactions, private-jet tantrums, questionable hair makeovers, vomit-marred staff parties and many self-aggrandizing comparisons to Steve Jobs.
That last sentence is glorious; well done, Hess. — SDB
Friday on Best Evidence: Undercurrent, The Bank Panther (?), and more.
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